Dinosaurs once again roam the earth when the spectacular production, Walking With Dinosaurs The Arena Spectacular, based on the award-winning BBC Television Series, comes to The Palace of Auburn Hills for an eight-show engagement from August 6-10, 2014.
Tickets at $59.50, $49.50, $39.50, $19.50 reserved are on sale at Palacenet.com, The Palace Ticket Store and all Ticketmaster locations. Tickets may be also charged by phone to American Express, Discover, Visa and MasterCard by calling 800.745.3000.
Walking With Dinosaurs The Arena Spectacular depicts the dinosaurs’ evolution with almost cinematic realism. The show has scenes of the interactions between dinosaurs, how carnivorous dinosaurs evolved to walk on two legs, and how the herbivores fended off their more agile predators.
This updated production will showcase changes to the dinosaurs based on the latest scientific research including the likely feathering of some species. Worldwide, more than eight million people have seen this show in 243 cities and over 2,000 performances.
Ten species are represented from the entire 200 million year reign of the dinosaurs. The show includes the Tyrannosaurus Rex, the terror of the ancient terrain, as well as the Plateosaurus and Liliensternus from the Triassic period, the Stegosaurus and Allosaurus from the Jurassic period and Torosaurus and Utahraptor from the awesome Cretaceous period. The largest of them, the Brachiosaurus is 36 feet tall, and 56 feet from nose to tail. It took a team of 50 – including engineers, fabricators, skin makers, artists and painters, and animatronic experts – a year to build the production.
The 20 dinosaurs were originally “hatched” by Sonny Tilders, the head of creature design at Creature Technology Company in a Melbourne Docklands workshop big enough to park a 747.
“Many of the technologies we are using on Walking With Dinosaurs The Arena Spectacular are borrowed from film, said Tilders. “The computer software and hardware we have developed is based on the systems used to control animatronic creatures in feature films.”
“The puppeteers use ‘voodoo rigs’ to make many of the dinosaurs move. They are miniature versions of the dinosaurs with the same joints and range of movement as their life-sized counterparts. The puppeteer manipulates the voodoo rig and these actions are interpreted by computer and transmitted by radio waves to make the hydraulic cylinders in the actual dinosaur replicate the action, with a driver hidden below the animal, helping to maneuver it around the arena.”
Suited puppeteer specialists, who are inside the creatures, operate five of the smaller dinosaurs.
Artistic Director William May developed the creative vision of the show based on an original idea by entrepreneur Bruce Mactaggart to create an arena version of the Walking with Dinosaurs television series. A talented and experienced team of creative artists came together to produce Walking With Dinosaurs The Arena Spectacular.
The show is directed by Broadway veteran Scott Faris, the set and projected image design are by Peter England; lighting is by John Rayment, the score was composed by James Brett and Warner Brown wrote the script.
“We take the audience on a journey back in time and show them how the dinosaurs might have actually looked in their prime - huge, sometimes frightening, sometimes comical monsters - that fought for survival every day of their lives,” said Director Scott Faris. “Our dinosaurs move exactly like they are real -- with all the roars, snorts and excitement that go with it. The realism is mind-blowing!"
Tim Haines, creator and producer of the original BBC series, which was seen by a worldwide audience of 700 million, serves as Project Consultant. The series won six Emmy and three BAFTA Awards.
Walking With Dinosaurs The Arena Spectacular was originally produced in Australia by Gerry Ryan, Malcolm Cooke and Jill Bryant and is brought to the world by Global Creatures.
Do you have a dinosaur lover in your house that would love to see the show? We are giving away 4 tickets! To enter to win tickets to the Wednesday, August 6th show at 7:00 PM, leave us a comment below telling us your child's favorite dinosaur. A winner will be chosen via random.org on July 25th. All entries must be complete by 12:00 noon on July 25th. You must be a Macomb Macaroni Kid newsletter subscriber in order to win. Winners will be notified via email and will have 24 hours to respond before their prize is forfeited and another winner is chosen. Good luck!
