Tinkerbell Disney Park Costume - H 2012
A teenage couple dressed as Tinker Bell and Peter Pan were denied admission at one of the Walt Disney World theme parks and the emotional testimony from the girl has gone viral on the Internet.
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On Tuesday, WKMG in Orlando posted a news story about the incident, which was picked up by Yahoo’s Web show Odd News (anchor Greg Proops called the segment “Stinkerbell”), and the video has been making the rounds from there.
In the video, embedded below, 15-year-old April Spielman unsuccessfully fights back tears as she recalls how Disney employees forced her and her boyfriend to make a costume change.
“It ruined my dream, because I just wanted to be Tinker Bell,” she says.
Spielman describes how she spent months making the two costumes, and how it took her two hours to apply her makeup that day and another hour to fix her hair. It wasn’t a complete waste of time, as one park let the couple in but another bought them new, normal-looking clothes (sandals, shorts and shirts) and insisted they wear them instead.
Disney said they asked the guests to change clothes because their homemade outfits looked too much like the ones real walkaround characters might wear.
“The costumes were disruptive to our operation and possibly confusing to our other guests, as children were asking to take photos with them,” a Disney spokeswoman said. “To make up for any inconvenience, we provided them with replacement clothing and assisted them with the rest of their visit in our parks.”
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The popularity of the video is reminiscent of one four months ago involving a curse-laden brawl outside the Tower of Terror ride at Disney’s California Adventure. That video, also embedded below, also went viral.
Email: paul.bond@thr.com
