Honey, I Shrunk the Audience

Honey, I Shrunk The Audience! was a 3D film at several Disney theme parks themed to the Honey, I Shrunk the Kids film series. It first opened at Epcot's Imagination Pavilion in 1994, Disneyland in 1998, and Disneyland Paris in 1999. It also opened at Tokyo Disneyland in 1997 under the name MicroAdventure!

This attraction closed in 2010 where it was replaced by Captain EO, the attraction it had replaced in the first place.

Story
Viewers enter the Imagination Institute's theater for the Inventor of the Year Award Ceremony, in which Professor Wayne Szalinski is receiving the award. Attendees are asked to put on their "safety goggles" in preparation for the scientific demonstrations. The show opens with the crew of the show searching for Wayne, when he suddenly flies on stage miniaturized and in a transportation device called a Hoverpod.

He accidentally drops the control box and sends the machine flying off behind the stage out of control. It comes back and destroys the neon Imagination Institute "Inventor of the Year" sign over the audience (at first only some letters are knocked out, leaving "NERD" spelled diagonally).

Wayne's son, Nick, demonstrates some of his father's other inventions to kill time while the crew searches for Wayne. This does not go smoothly, and the audience ends up screaming with loose mice running under their seats and a holographic "Holo-Pet" lion in their faces. While the demonstrations go awry, Wayne manages to use his shrinking machine to return himself back to normal size. He brings it out to demonstrate its uses by shrinking a family's luggage, saving space and money when traveling.

Unfortunately, the machine goes out of control and shrinks the audience (plus Nick, who pushes Dr. Nigel Channing out of the way of the machine's electro-beam). The viewers are antagonized by obstacles such as Wayne's younger son, Adam, taking a picture of them (with a blinding flash) and picking up the theater to "show the little people to Mommy." (The whole room is literally lifted right off its construction for a minute or two before Channing persuades Adam to put the theater back where he found it.)

Then Nick's pet python, Gigabyte, much larger than the miniature audience, nearly eats them, as he was not fed yet that day. Quark, the Szalinskis' dog, then chases him away with a few barks. Luckily, Wayne fixes the machine and returns the audience back to normal size, but Quark is momentarily affected by the enlarging ray and then runs backstage out of sight.

Wayne accepts his award and begins his speech, but he is interrupted by Nick warning of a "big, humongous problem." The now giant Quark walks out onto the stage and the curtain closes while viewers hear the Imagination Institute's crew trying to stop him from crushing the place. He then finds his way through the curtain and sneezes on the audience for the finale. As they leave, they can hear the commotion from backstage continue.

Facts

 * It was sponsored by Kodak.
 * The movie is presented in 3D by using polarized glasses and projectors.
 * The entire audience is on a platform that moves up to four inches high during the presentation to simulate the theater moving and the floor shaking.
 * This attraction is often abbreviated by its Cast Members as HISTA. At Disneyland in Anaheim, California, they refer to each other as Histaceans.
 * Eric Idle's character, Dr. Nigel Channing, reacts with fear and disgust when Nick announces his pet python, Gigabyte. Idle, of course, became famous as a different sort of Python.
 * Despite Adam claiming Photon is his mouse, it and all its duplicates are white rats, used due to their greater size and visibility.
 * The sound effect used for the shrinking machine when used to enlarge Wayne (the first time it is used in the show) was the same sound effect that is used in Captain EO as the noise his spaceship makes when he leaves the planet with his crew at the end of the show.
 * Kristie Smithers asks, "Shouldn't we wait for Professor Szalinski?" This is a direct reference to the film Honey, I Blew Up the Kid in which a scientist asks "Shouldn't we wait for Szalinski?"
 * Hugh Allison who founded The Yellowchair Performance Experience, worked on this attraction in Paris for six months.
 * One of the actors on the balcony along the top of the screen accidentally hit his leg during the last two minutes of the film. Once you are back to normal size, anyone who focuses on the two of them will notice this, and the way that he limps off.
 * The equipment on the head of some of the extras was supposed to be filming the show for the World News Network, hence whatever is on the smaller (non 3D) screen to the side of the main one is supposed to have been filmed from one of these head cams. On occasion they do differ in details however, such as towards the end, when Adam is wearing the full safety glasses in the main one, but just the frames in the sub-one.
 * The popular song True Colors was played as part of the preshow film as an advertisement for Kodak. At Epcot, It was sung by two unknown artists. At the Disneyland Resort Paris version, it was sung by Cyndi Lauper.

Cast

 * Eric Idle as Dr. Nigel Channing
 * Rick Moranis as Wayne Szalinski
 * Robert Oliveri as Nick Szalinski
 * Marcia Strassman as Diane Szalinski
 * Daniel and Joshua Shalikar as Adam Szalinski
 * Katherine Lanasa as Kristie Smithers

Production credits

 * Directed by Randal Kleiser
 * Written by Bill Prady and Steve Spiegel
 * Produced by Edward S. Feldman and Dawn Steel
 * Production Executive - Steven Keller
 * Production Designer - Leslie Dilley
 * Director Of Photography - John Hora
 * Visual Effects - Eric Brevig
 * Original score - Bruce Broughton