Since opening in 1992, the anchor attraction of Disney Village at Disneyland Resort Paris has been Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show, a dining and entertainment spectacular inspired by the real exposition William F. "Buffalo Bill" Cody toured through Europe from 1889-1906.
Thanks to a partnership with the Buffalo Bill Museum in Colorado, the lobby of the theater is packed with posters, photographs and artifacts recalling Cody's time in Europe. The exhibit focuses particularly on the period of April to June, 1905, when Buffalo Bill's Wild West and Congress of Rough Riders of the World (the original show's full title) played the Champ de Mars in Paris.
Photographs of the massive show and some of the tour's more famous guest stars (like Sitting Bull, below) help ground the Disney Village attraction in reality and provide a true sense of history. This is no mere rodeo. You're about to experience a reenactment of events that happened here more than a century ago.
Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show isn't all history lesson, though. It's also loads of fun. On the way in to your arena-side seat, be sure to grab a cowboy hat. These keepsakes come with colored bands that (in typical dinner show fashion) separate sections of the audience into teams.
As you tuck into the chili, cornbread and ribs, the lights go down for the show to begin. Buffalo Bill himself rides center stage to address the crowd and get things going, bringing to life a highly-authentic demonstration of elements of life in the old west.
Apart from the competition sequences which involve plenty of audience participation, the show also features segments recreating the Pony Express, and Indian attack and a stagecoach robbery. The cast, both human and animal, has been brought to Paris from the United States and includes skilled rodeo cowboys, Native Americans, horses, longhorn cattle and (most impressive of all) a thundering herd of real bison.
The show is at once both reverent and funny, stunning and "down home." In 2009, as a way to reinvigorate the show and inspire repeat visitation, Mickey and the gang were added to the mix. While Disney characters may seem contrary to everything else the show is trying to achieve, they're brought in at just the right moments so as not to upset the more historic aspects of the presentation.
It's been nearly 100 years since William Cody passed, but his spirit and the spirit of the Wild West he loved so much are alive and well today at Disneyland Resort Paris.
