Since the park’s opening, Disneyland fans have studied and analyzed every possible angle of the park’s history. The seemingly impossible construction timeline that led to Disneyland’s disastrous opening day has been mythologized, but much of that process has never been seen, until now. Even with decades of books, specials, and retrospectives, much of Disneyland’s first year has remained out of view.
Disneyland is the project that transformed the travel industry and Disney. The details of the year leading up to the opening matter quite a bit. Now, we have a rare new look at this year in an exciting new project that debuts on January 22, 2026. Mickey Visit brings you the latest Disney news and planning resources, including upcoming park closures and exciting new foods coming to Disneyland. See the upcoming 2026 Disney World Lightning Lane changes.
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New Disneyland Project Debuts on January 22
The behind-the-scenes process of building Disneyland in that first year is coming to life in a new feature documentary that debuts on January 22, 2026. Disneyland Handcrafted, the new documentary from Leslie Iwerks, debuts on Disney+ and Disney’s YouTube channel, using rare archival footage and original audio recordings to place viewers inside the year leading up to Disneyland’s opening on July 17, 1955. We previously shared details about the announcement of this film here.
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Built from newly unearthed 16mm film reels from the Walt Disney Archives that Iwerks discovered while working on The Imagineering Story, the film offers a ground-level look at the artists, craftspeople, and Imagineers who physically built the park.
The movie documents the immense pressure on crews to create the Happiest Place on Earth and realize Walt Disney’s vision.
An Oscar and Emmy nominated filmmaker, Leslie Iwerks comes from a family steeped in Disney legacy. The granddaughter of Ub Iwerks (Walt Disney’s original animator and designer/co-creator of Mickey Mouse) and the daughter of Don Iwerks (a Disney camera technician and inventor), Leslie is the producer and director of the new documentary film.
Two film pioneers, Disney Legends, and Oscar winners, Ub and Don Iwerks made their mark at Disney: Ub worked at Disney in the early days of the company as an animator and special effects wizard, whereas Don worked at Disney in the ‘50s, ultimately overseeing the Studio Machine Shop and the Camera Service Department.
In fact, Leslie’s grandfather and father were particularly instrumental in a large portion of the creativity that has helped take The Walt Disney Company to revolutionary heights over the years. From the landmark creation of Mickey Mouse to the invention of the multiplane camera and the development of the 360-degree camera that led to the first Circle-Vision 360° film format, Leslie grew up surrounded by these stunning technological feats that helped pave the way for her to become an Academy Award-nominated filmmaker herself.
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We sat down with Leslie Iwerks yesterday at the Walt Disney Studios to discuss the new project and how she delivers such reverential, yet truthful, work in her documentaries. While there, Disney Parks Chairman Josh D’Amaro stopped by to say hello. See that and video of the moments with Iwerks in the reel embedded at the bottom of our article.
For Iwerks, whose career has included definitive documentaries on Pixar, Industrial Light & Magic, Warner Bros., and Disney Imagineering, the project carried a unique weight. I asked about her unique style that heightens the things she is covering and brings weight to the subject. Her work is never jaded and that really shines through.
“I never take it for granted,” she said of her approach to storytelling. “I look at every project as a challenge, and I have to live up to what they accomplished. If I take on a project, I already have a certain sense of reverence for it.”
That sense of responsibility was amplified by the footage itself, which was shot during Walt Disney’s lifetime by original Disney cameramen. “I challenged myself to say, ‘Can I live up to the footage that Stuart Jewell and the other cameramen photographed?’” Iwerks explained. “They did it so lovingly and wonderfully and artistically, and it was important to me to cut that together in a way that they would be happy about. Really the intention that they had while shooting is fulfilled by this project.”
Iwerks sees Disneyland Handcrafted as the foundational story of everything that followed. “I have a huge respect for this company,” she said. “This story was the DNA story of the creation of everything that came after Disneyland.” The film focuses on the construction days, when nothing was guaranteed. “How do you tell the story of the blueprint of Disneyland and the happiness that evolved from it?” she wondered.
Iwerks’ career as a documentarian began almost by necessity rather than design. While at USC film school, she felt an urgency to preserve the legacy of her grandfather, Ub Iwerks, as many of the people who had worked alongside him were getting older. “The first film I did was a film on my grandfather,” she said. “It was like this burning desire out of USC film school to make that film because a lot of the people that worked with him had passed away or were passing away.” With no prior experience making documentaries, she pitched the project directly to Roy E. Disney in Walt Disney’s former office. “I’d never pitched anything to any studio executive before,” Iwerks recalled. “He said, ‘Absolutely, let me see what I can do to make this happen,’” which led to Disney backing the film and launching her documentary career.
That project set the direction for the work that followed. “That was really the beginning of my career inadvertently doing documentaries,” Iwerks said. The film caught the attention of Pixar leaders John Lasseter and Ed Catmull, who asked her to tell the studio’s story. From there, Iwerks went on to document organizations including Industrial Light and Magic, Riot Games, Warner Bros., DC Comics, and Hearst. Across those projects, she returned to what she describes as “the intersection of business, creativity, and innovation.” Those experiences shaped how she approaches stories about large creative institutions and the risks behind breakthrough ideas, including her work on The Imagineering Story.
Unlike The Imagineering Story, which spans decades of innovation, Disneyland Handcrafted intentionally narrows its focus. “By the time we settled on this idea, it was a much simpler way to tell the story,” Iwerks said. “I didn’t have to fill it with tons of information”. That choice was deliberate. “The information about Disneyland is in books, it’s in other films, it’s in The Imagineering Story,” she said. “What I wanted people to do was live in this footage and experience the construction, the making, the tension, and the pressures that led up to opening day.”
The footage itself was originally commissioned by Walt Disney, primarily for use on Disneyland’s ABC television series. “Walt tasked these cameramen to document the making of the park,” Iwerks explained. “They would use it for the TV show leading up to opening day”. While some of that material has surfaced over the years, much of what Iwerks uncovered had never been publicly seen.
“What we discovered was all the stuff we had never seen,” she said. “Details of hand craftsmanship—hands painting, hands sculpting, hands shaving, hands burning things”. As those images emerged, the identity of the project clicked into place. “When we realized all the shots of hands and the creative shots of putting this together, I was like, ‘It’s Disneyland Handcrafted,” she said. “That title came to me. That’s what it is.”
Iwerks explained how the film came together in a promotional piece, saying, “I was with Jason Recher, an executive on the Disney Experiences team, and I was telling him about the project and he said, ‘Send me a link.’ He just immediately said, ‘This is amazing. We should be making this film. This is history right here.’ It really took one person’s vision to see the importance of this project and help bring it to life.”
When asked about the self-referential nature of the footage and how documenting Disneyland also helped fund and promote the project, Iwerks explained, “Walt had the vision to have somebody document it,” she said. “It was also out of necessity. He had time-lapse cameras everywhere so he could see the evolution and make sure it was going to happen on time.”
For Iwerks, discovering unused footage shot by other documentarians carried special meaning. “For me as a documentarian, to find footage of other documentarians that hadn’t been used and be able to put their work together—that’s what’s meaningful to me,” she said. “It’s almost like this meta experience.”
That perspective is shaped by her own upbringing. Iwerks grew up experiencing Disney from behind the scenes through her father, Don Iwerks. “Having grown up going to Disneyland behind the scenes with my dad, I’ve experienced Disneyland in that sort of behind the scenes way, versus always going in the front gate like everyone does. I’ve always lived in this backstage kind of world,” she said. “This is the first time I’ve really seen the backstage of the making of Disneyland. It’s the real thing. It’s the beginning of everything”.
While the original Disneyland television show presented an optimistic, carefully curated version of progress, Disneyland Handcrafted embraces contrast. “Walt was making an entertaining television show,” Iwerks said. “You never really felt the pressure in the way that you feel it in the documentary we put together.”
The film uses the construction footage against the footage of Walt on the TV show. “You cut from Walt on TV promoting it to the real world of the pressures and the fact that they’re three months out and it’s still complete dirt in a lot of areas,” she said. “That was the dichotomy and the contrast was really interesting.”
The honesty that Iwerks describes in the documentary demonstrates the incredible barriers that Disney was up against and the determination of the crews to make the dream a reality. We look forward to seeing Disneyland Handcrafted this week.
Here’s a video from my interview yesterday with Leslie at the Walt Disney Studios.
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Stay tuned for more of the latest Disney news, including more looks at the upcoming release of Disneyland Handcrafted.
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