One of my biggest reporting projects of the summer has been released for Insider: a retrospective of the “Disney Channel Games!” Launching with Disney Channel’s “So Hot Summer” of 2006, the series was developed in the style of “Battle of the Network Stars,” except that all competitors were from the Disney Channel universe. After investigating how the series was made, I’m ready to share behind-the-scenes info and passages of mine that you didn’t see in the published piece!
Let’s start with Lucas Grabeel and Monique Coleman in the hamster ball race. Perhaps Grabeel’s “HSM” character, Ryan Evans, would call the event “a crowd favorite”:
In 2006, the “High School Musical” stars were racing to the finish line at the inaugural “Disney Channel Games.” Enclosed in giant plastic hamster balls, the actors were neck and neck for the first round, but Grabeel rolled ahead to claim the win in their rematch. “That was my favorite thing I’ve ever done in life,” Coleman told me.
You might remember that a number of events (like the hamster ball relay) took place indoors for that first year. The original location was College of the Canyons in Santa Clarita, California. Once the event moved to Orlando, Florida, there was a lot more room for outdoor games. Eager fans attended some of the filming in person, and viewers at home continued to engage with the show.
The “DC Games” infiltrated cable and on-demand. Kids went online to support their teams and play to win the stars points – this was back in the day when we all wanted to see our usernames live on TV! The franchise “was Disney Channel’s biggest multi-platform event” in 2007 (per 7Ate9 Entertainment). “Here, have some Disney Channel Games trading cards that I went out of my way to save to my computer in 2007,” Tumblr user @anonymous-understatement wrote years later.
What was the experience of the Disney Channel stars during this competition? What do they remember? Those questions were even more important to this story than the fan experience. Roger González, who hosted the series “Zapping Zone” in Disney Channel Latin America, has positive memories of his entire Disney experience. “I think that for all of us, Disney was a great school that gave us the opportunity to develop as artists. It was a catapult to realize careers [and] many other later projects. I will always be grateful to Disney for that decade in my career.” He said focusing on the competition at the “DC Games” was a great way to bond with the other stars. When I spoke with Alyson Stoner, they clarified how competitors were chosen, and what effects being included or excluded could have on a young actor:
“I grew up as an athlete, loving games, challenges, puzzles. So I remember when they invited me, it did feel like I had been affirmed as a special, exclusive, cool kid,” Stoner said.
“What’s interesting is, even though I had worked on ‘Mike’s Super Short Show’ for [Disney] previously, for many years, that show was owned by Buena Vista Home Entertainment and not Disney. So I actually wasn’t included in a lot of the cast [events], like the ‘Circle of Life’ music video and all these other ancillary opportunities. … ‘Camp Rock’ gave me the pass.” The actor’s many recurring roles “didn’t make the cut in terms of hierarchy, which, from a business standpoint, makes total sense,” they said. “You want to feature the cast that the audience connects to most. But when you’re young and you don’t yet know how to quantify yourself as an artist versus a product versus whatever, it feels a little personal. And like, ‘What’s wrong with me?’” Stoner explained.
I am so grateful for Alyson Stoner’s perspective (check out their podcast, Dear Hollywood). Every person I spoke with for this piece was lovely and took it very seriously. Michael Seater was the one Disney Channel star I interviewed who did not compete in the Games. Instead, he was a correspondent on the field for Canada’s Family Channel (you can read more about Family and Disney in my conversation with Life with Derek creator Daphne Ballon).
“They all know each other so well, all those Disney kids. And I’m like the random guy who’s on their channel that they’ve never met,” Seater said, calling himself “the redheaded stepchild.” He said he was welcomed “into the fold with the core bigwigs and ended up just having the most wild week with everybody.”
Michael Seater also called Kevin Jonas Jr. “sort of the elder of the group,” which I love. 2008 was the only year the Jonas Brothers competed (they had gotten a taste of the spectacle as performers in ’07).
The debut episode in 2008 showed Nick Jonas and Selena Gomez sitting together at the back of a charter bus with the other Disney Channel stars on their way to the sports complex. Clever editing built up anticipation through voiceover confessionals, as the stars surveyed their surroundings and wondered who their teammates would be. Teams later chilled in tents on inflatable furniture. If they won an event, they could go in a special winners’ tent or make a toast to their victory with celebratory smoothies.
My Insider story includes interesting changes that were made over the course of the “DC Games,” but here are a couple more:
The 2006 production had woven in animated hosts like Kim Possible and Dr. Drakken, but 2007’s editing team put Kim and her crew on the field cheering. Then, 2008’s team removed the animation element entirely and opted for real-life cheerleaders. Even the theme music was revamped. Where Olympic-style instrumental cues played throughout 2006 and 2007, the 2008 Games opened with a peppy vocal theme, sung by none other than Booboo Stewart.
That’s right. Booboo Stewart. He used to be in a group called T-Squad. In a Tiger Beat blog post dated April 25, 2008, Stewart wrote that he had just finished recording the song. As we know, he worked with Disney again in the Descendants franchise, which feels like a very different era from that of the “DC Games.”
The 2007 and 2008 seasons featured stars from Disney Channels Worldwide. There’s a fascinating connection between them that I want to delve into more. Ambra Lo Faro played Mafalda/Mafy in Quelli dell’intervallo (above), the prototype series for As the Bell Rings and other versions all over the world. Lo Faro explained that she played the equivalent of Demi Lovato’s character, Charlotte. Andrea Guasch was in Disney Channel Spain’s iteration, Cambio de Clasé, and Isabella Soric from Disney Channel Germany starred in Disney’s Kurze Pause, playing the same role as Guasch. And they all went to the “DC Games!”
I would be remiss not to mention the dance-off/dunk-off of 2007. Sabrina Bryan remembered being paired with Kyle Massey. Corbin Bleu didn’t remember quite as much from his turn with Kiely Williams, but we had a fun exchange about the event:
Allison: I’ve been asked specifically by some fans to bring up your iconic dancing here. … Does some of that ring a bell?
Corbin: Wow. That’s like watching someone that I don’t even know. That’s so crazy. I don’t remember any of that. I don’t remember being in that moment, but going back and watching it, I remember the tone. I remember the feeling of what the “Disney Channel Games” were. But it’s incredible how much life has been stuffed into the years, especially the Disney years, you’re doing [so much] every single day. So sometimes, it all becomes a blur. So going back and watching that right now, truly, it’s like watching a different person. That’s amazing. I can say I recognize, stylistically, the dancing and where I was at in that moment in time, because I know if you even asked me to dance now, just the skillset or the moves or whatever it’s going to be, it’s going to be a different set than where I was in that moment. And I can see that I was really in “Jump In” world. That’s so interesting.
The question no one could answer was, “Why did the Disney Channel Games end?” An earlier version of my article pointed to the known theory that Friends for Change was the reason (you know, the project responsible for our annual Earth Day bop “Send It On?”):
In 2009, a Disney spokesperson told PopStar! that instead of the “DC Games,” Disney would be shifting their focus to “the launch of a new pro-social initiative with Disney Channel and Disney XD stars.” In hindsight, this must have been Disney’s Friends for Change. A onetime season of “Disney’s Friends for Change Games” later aired throughout summer 2011, but the “DC Games” never returned.
Raphael Rosalen, who is now a PhD student, wrote a 2018 scholarly paper on the “Disney Channel Games.” Rosalen discusses scandals from that time period and names the “possibility that the Disney Channel wanted to move away from the direction of its star-establishing ‘Disney Channel Games’ platform to salvage the brand of their most popular stars.” Further, the scholar adds, “If the ‘Disney Channel Games’ was only setting up stars with a focus on their personalities and celebrity factor, Disney needed to put a spin on their personas and give those stars a positive narrative that aligned more with Disney’s positive brand. That is where the Disney’s Friends for Change movement comes in to play.”
I’m sharing that theory from a purely speculative viewpoint. Here’s another: In March 2009, a Disney press release read, “The Walt Disney Company today announced a landmark set of strategic environmental goals and challenging 3 to 5 year targets to reduce emissions, waste, electricity and fuel use, and its impact on water and ecosystems.” This was part of the company’s 2008 “Corporate Responsibility Report.” In a May 2009 “Friends for Change” press release, Bob Iger references “recently announced environmental goals,” so Disney overall was already tuned into going green. Maybe that’s all there was to it.
As we’re seeing from Miley Cyrus’ “Used to Be Young” rollout, it wasn’t easy to be a Disney Channel star. It simply wasn’t. Even if the stars had fun at the “DC Games,” they were still working hard. Many of them were competing on the field and then performing in the 2007 and 2008 concerts — or even doing press for other projects that same week. For the final year, Demi Lovato gave us a gem of an interview with Cody Linley and Meaghan Martin before taking the stage. This audience was huge to Demi, considering that they’d only performed for about 100 people before!
I’m so glad I had the opportunity to learn more about what the “Disney Channel Games” required, and what the stars involved remember. Here’s the original story, if you’d like to read all the rest! I’ll leave you with this important quote from Jason Dolley:
“We all are working on shows as kids, which is a very abnormal thing, a sort of abnormal experience to have as young people. And so there’s this immediate camaraderie with everybody where we sort of all understand something about each other without having to say anything to each other. We all sort of understand what this life is sort of like, in our own ways.”
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