Haunted Mansion Holiday (known as Haunted Mansion Holiday Nightmare in Tokyo Disneyland) is a seasonal overlay of The Haunted Mansion attraction at Disneyland and Tokyo Disneyland that blends the settings and characters of the original Haunted Mansion with those of the 1993 film The Nightmare Before Christmas. Taking inspiration from "The Night Before Christmas", the attraction retells the story of Jack Skellington (as "Sandy Claws") visiting the Haunted Mansion on Christmas Eve, leaving holiday chaos in his wake.
The Haunted Mansion typically closes for two weeks in early August so it can be converted into the Haunted Mansion Holiday. The overlaid attraction is then open to guests from late August through early January before being closed again to remove the overlay.
History Two similar overlays – Country Bear Christmas Special (1984) and It's a Small World Holiday (1997) – had already been successful for some time when Haunted Mansion Holiday was developed. Initially, Disney considered doing a retelling of Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol, but decided against it due to the attraction's setting in New Orleans Square and the incongruity of bringing Santa Claus into the eerie environment of the Haunted Mansion. Instead, they decided to base it on The Nightmare Before Christmas after considering which Disney character would celebrate Christmas in the Haunted Mansion, should Santa Claus ever land there on his journey. Steve Davison took the idea and worked with Walt Disney Creative Entertainment to develop the overlay.
One issue Disney had to deal with was the fact that many of the key performers in the original attraction – Paul Frees, Leota Toombs, Eleanor Audley, most of the singing busts, and almost all of the original voice actors – had died years earlier. Frees was replaced in his role as the Ghost Host by Corey Burton, who had done voiceover work with Disney before and had also served as Frees's protégé prior to the latter's death. Toombs's daughter, Kim Irvine, resembled her mother and was thus chosen to perform in her place as Madame Leota, with Susan Blakeslee (impersonating Audley and whom she once trained under), providing the character's voice. The singing busts were topped with Jack-O-Lanterns and given computer-animated singing projections. New voice actors were picked for the graveyard ghosts that sound similar to the originals.
Haunted Mansion Holiday opened October 3, 2001, and quickly became popular with guests, leading to the attraction's FastPass machines being activated during the overlay (they are now always active). On September 13, 2013 (Friday the 13th), the Haunted Mansion at Disneyland opened to the public outfitted with new effects and set pieces in celebration of its 13th year. Walt Disney World Resort and Disneyland Paris do not have seasonal overlays. Outside of Phantom Manor, guests can get their photo taken with Jack and Sally.
The overlay was not presented in 2020 at either Disneyland or Tokyo Disneyland in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Disneyland remained closed from March 2020 to early 2021 due to two stay-at-home orders and closure of theme parks issued by California Governor Gavin Newsom, while the since-reopened Tokyo Disneyland opted not to offer certain seasonal offerings through at least March 2021.
On July 25, 2024, Disneyland announced that Haunted Mansion Holiday will be reopened early on July 29, 2024, prior to the start of the Halloween season. Since the beginning of January 2024, the Disneyland version of Haunted Mansion ride had begun another extensive refurbishment to reform and expand the outdoor queue, modify the nearby Magnolia Park in New Orleans Square, and add a gift shop at the ride's exit.
Storyline The Haunted Mansion Holiday takes place shortly after the events of the film it conjoins with, The Nightmare Before Christmas, where Jack Skellington, who tried to create his very own twisted Christmas in a Halloween-style overlay in the movie, now discovers the Haunted Mansion, home to 999 Happy Haunts. Deciding to spread joy to the mansion's gloomy residents for the holidays, Jack and his creepy crew from Halloween Town bring hundreds of Jack's original evil Christmas presents and decorations to the manor and deck the haunting grounds for a thrilling and chilling holiday for the Grim Grinning Ghosts inhabiting the abandoned house, setting the stage for the ride itself.
Attraction The outside of the mansion has been covered in both jack-o-lanterns and Halloween-style Christmas decorations. On the roof is Jack Skellington's coffin sleigh and stretched from the roof to the ground is his comical "Christmas Equation". There is also the countdown clock from Halloween Town that tells how many days are left until Christmas. A music box track from Disneyland Paris's Phantom Manor plays in the outdoor areas. At Tokyo Disneyland, the mansion does not have a countdown clock or a Christmas Equation hanging from the roof because of the design differences between the mansions. Instead, pumpkin snowmen can be seen and orchestrations from the movie and ride play in the queue area.
Guests are then ushered into the foyer, which has been decorated with skull wreaths and such. The Ghost Host begins to tell the story of the attraction in rhyme. From there, guests proceed into one of the two portrait chambers. At Tokyo, a painting of Jack transforming from the Pumpkin King to his Santa Claus guise replaces the Aging Man changing portrait.
Guests then enter the portrait gallery. The stretching portraits have been replaced with stained-glass pictures depicting innocent Christmas scenes with wreaths as their frames. When the doors close, the chamber goes dark and begins to stretch. The pictures burst into shards, and luminescent paintings of Halloween Town's Christmas vision emerge, depicting Jack as Santa Claus riding his coffin sleigh high above the Mansion, a man-eating wreath, scary toys, Santa Claus opening a giant sack as ghosts rise up and a giant carnivorous snake. The Ghost Host begins reciting a dark variation of the poem Twas the Night Before Christmas poem as eerie music plays, extensively featuring a choir. The suspense builds until lightning crashes and Jack's face appears in the ceiling above, cackling, "Happy Holidays, everyone!"; this replaces the hanging body of the Ghost Host. His laughter fills the room, a woman screams in a high pitch and everything goes pitch black. In 2013, Jack's face is replaced by a new animated projection of him and Zero and the hanging body of the Ghost Host remains intact.
As the lights return to normal, the doors open, leading into the portrait hallway. The changing portraits here have also been replaced with ones depicting:
Sally holding a small Christmas Tree that burns making Sally sad. The Haunted Mansion turning into Haunted Mansion Holiday. Jack Skellington dressed as Santa Claus holding a present and turning into the way he normally looks holding a jack-o-lantern. A Snowman that turns into a snowman made of pumpkins. Santa Claus in his sleigh who turns into Jack Skellington dressed as Santa Claus flying a sleigh that's pulled by the Skeletal Reindeer from the film.
The choir returns as the song Kidnap the Sandy Claws begins to play. A snowstorm appears to be taking place outside the windows and the three musicians from the movie are also standing outside. The staring busts have spider-webs in front of them that glisten with the words "NOEL" and "HO-HO-HO." The loading area is decorated with even more Halloween and Christmas décor and there is a huge animated Christmas card with many of the characters from the movie celebrating the season. The card is much of a treat to the eyes itself, featuring the words "MERRY CHRISTMAS" at the bottom of the card, where the message changes to "SCARY CHRISTMAS" intermittently. At Tokyo, there is no portrait hall like Disneyland's. Instead, immediately after the portrait chamber, the guests enter the loading area, which is decorated with orange Christmas lights and Halloween pumpkins. After boarding, the guests glide underneath a landing from where Jack, Sally, and the Vampire Teddy greet guests. The ride-through Portrait Corridor features portraits of the film's characters performing various activities and watching as the guests go by. Orange Christmas lights wrap around the staring busts in the library as Zero wraps a floating tree made out of books with tinsel garland. In the music room, guests see a life-size audio-animatronic Sally, seeming depressed and sitting in the chair next to the ghostly piano that the Vampire Teddy plays. The vehicles then move up the stairs, passing terrified green cockroaches in cages with gift tags that read "For Oogie." At the top of the stairs, Oogie Boogie's shadow appears and turns into a Christmas tree shape in the full moon above. The original black-lighted rubber spiders remain.
At Anaheim Disneyland, upon boarding the vehicles (referred to as Black Christmas Sleighs in the overlay), guests ascend the staircase. At the top, there are piles of presents with the Vampire Teddy sitting on them, fishing for humans. As the Ghost Host continues telling the story, Zero is now seen floating in the endless hallway in place of the candelabra. The moving suit of armor wears a pumpkin mask and has garland wrapped around it. A pile of dog bones in front of the hallway and a wreath made of dog bones adorns the top of the hall. On one floating bone, a tag reads "To Zero". Presents sit in the chair and poinsettias reside next to that chair.
The corpse trapped in the coffin in the conservatory is unchanged, but the Vampire Teddy now sits on it, hammering nails back in. A tag reading "Do Not Open Till Xmas" hangs from the lid. The dead funeral flowers have sprung to life and now perform the song "Kidnap the Sandy Claws". The corridor of doors is now filled with the same comically vicious flowers, all singing loudly, although the doors and the sound effects that they play are still the same. Guests then pass underneath a large yellow-eyed man-eating wreath with teeth, which all the flowers seem to be connected to. The demonic grandfather clock and shadow claw remain the same but now has a tag that says "To Leota, Special Gifts for you - Sandy Claws".
Guests then enter the séance room. Madame Leota is in a Christmas ornament and floats along with several glowing bottles surrounding her and now chants "The 13 Days of Christmas" while the Vampire Teddy sits on the top of the chair behind Leota's table, ringing two tiny bells with the séance. A bewitched nutcracker with eyes glowing green moves its mouth in unison with Leota. The floating instruments are replaced with huge floating tarot cards, depicting Leota's 13 Christmas gifts of which she is chanting. In Tokyo, the raven remains in this scene and Leota is not in a Christmas ornament and is covered in candles with Lock, Shock, and Barrel looking at her through a window in the back of the room.
The Sleighs then move into the ballroom. The ghosts here are the same, but the decorations have changed. The table is set for a Christmas party and a huge gingerbread house sits in the center of the table. An immense dead Christmas tree (with one live branch at the top) covered in candles and spiders with lights now sits in the middle of the dance floor, but the ghosts waltz right through it. Zero floats above the scene near the tree as the duelists shoot at him. The curtains at the top of the staircase in the back of the hall have opened, revealing the mansion's library, complete with a floating tree made of books. In Tokyo, Jack and Sally's shadows are seen exchanging presents under the mistletoe behind that curtain instead. Also, instead of a gingerbread house, a giant cake is in the middle of the table.