With the shockwaves still rippling through the Disney theme park fan community of the Disneyland Abu Dhabi announcement, a new rumor from entertainment journalist and Puck News founding partner Matt Belloni says that Bob Iger vetoed plans for a Disneyland theme park in Saudi Arabia. The rumor comes from Belloni’s podcast, The Town, where he talks about the Abu Dhabi announcement, and shares a rumor that Iger shot down a proposal for the park to be located in Saudi Arabia instead. Here’s the latest.
Bob Iger Vetoed Plans for Disneyland Saudi Arabia
In talking about the Abu Dhabi announcement, Belloni and Bloomberg’s Lucas Shaw discuss the structure of the Abu Dhabi deal before jumping into the rumored Saudi Arabia proposal.
…not Saudis though. I heard there was a proposal on the table for this to be in Saudi, and Iger vetoed it.Iger would not go into business with the Saudis. But Abu Dhabi is like one step removed there. They still don’t allow gay people. Homosexuality is illegal, and that’s sort of burning up the Disney message boards this week.
Belloni and Shaw then discuss the fact that while Disney has received some heat for going into business in a country that is diametrically opposed to Disney’s stated company views, they haven’t received a lot of noisy backlash. We’re also surprised that Disney has been able to sidestep mainstream criticism for their Abu Dhabi announcement.
Belloni discusses the fact that Pixar’s Lightyear film was banned in the United Arab Emirates because of a brief same-sex kiss. There is a level of hypocrisy at play here that Iger and Disney Experiences Chairman Josh D’Amaro are seemingly perfectly fine being blind to thanks to an influx of cash. In fact, Iger called the UAE and Abu Dhabi the “perfect” location for a Disney theme park – seemingly not caring at all about the serious human rights issues in the country.
Turning to our thoughts briefly, I think that this rumor certainly holds water. I think that it’s entirely possible that Saudi Arabia was one of the Middle Eastern locations that there was a proposal for. In fact, Iger recently said that Disney had been eyeing the region since 2017 and that it wasn’t until he returned as CEO in 2022 that Disney started the ball rolling for the Abu Dhabi location.
For more of our coverage of the Disneyland Abu Dhabi project, check out our articles below!
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