With rumors swirling around about the future of Disney’s Hollywood Studios and a possible name change, Disney finally addressed the issue in a recent statement. Disney put the rumors to rest stating that the parks name will not be changing.
“In response to questions we have been receiving, we also want to let fans know that the Disney’s Hollywood Studios name will remain the same for the foreseeable future since we are immersing our guests in a place where imagined worlds of Hollywood unfold around them from movies and music, to television and theater”, the company said in a statement.
Rumors of a name change for Disney’s Hollywood studios have persisted since Disney CEO Bob Iger, not so subtly, hinted about it at a shareholder meeting back in 2015.
“It’s not announced. We used to be MGM Studios, we changed to Hollywood Studios and we’re doing some significant work there right now that I guess will result in a name change,” Iger said at the meeting. “We’ll announce that we’re changing the name, but we won’t announce what we’re changing it to. How’s that?” he continued.
So the “foreseeable future” still doesn’t mean they won’t be changing the name one day. We still know that with the evolving nature of the park a name change may still be the park’s future.
Toy Story Land is scheduled to open this summer at Hollywood Studios, and Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge opens in 2019 and neither of those projects had been announced when Iger made his off the cuff statement.
We know that the idea has been seriously considered by Disney, because back in August several Disney fans had received a survey asking their opinions of several potential new names for the park. The internet blew up last week with speculation that “Cinemagine Park” had been settled on, from that list, as the parks new name. Perhaps Disney didn’t like the survey results or maybe it was the reaction to the possible name choice that was floating around. In either case it’s clear that Disney doesn’t want possible name change to be a distraction to all of the upcoming changes.
If Disney really wanted to make it clear the name would remain the same indefinitely, they might have chosen different language for their statement. But for now everyone can rest easy that “Cinemagine Park” is not the new name of the Park. Perhaps Disney feels the Hollywood name does fit the future of the park, but only time will tell.