Month Of The Mansion: Meet & Greet: Madame Leota (With Les)

Moviefan12: You are very brave mortals that are willing to stay. Now tell me, have you ever attempted a seance to reach someone from the great beyond.  The mistress of today's reading might have the possessions to aid you in seeing someone that has been buried below.  Ah, and I see our captor  friend, Les is still here in the Mansion. Perhaps he could give us the fortune of this most infamous reader.  






LES: Hands down, the coolest use of a hologram EVER!…since it is 3 dimensional, as you travel around the crystal ball, you see her face rotate as you go…it’s quite remarkable and eerie as all getup! Like I said before, even knowing how the effects are done doesn’t make them any less amazing when you see them.

Moviefan12: Now as we attempt and make contact as we look at Voice Actress,  Personality, Scare Inside The Mansion, Scares Outside The Mansion, & finally What She Brings To The Mansion.  Les, are you ready to make contact?

LES: OH YES!!! I’M READY! BRING IT!

Voice Actresses/On Ride Face

Moviefan12:  Now in order to bring the mistress that wishes to raise the dead, it takes the craft of some bewitching figures.  The infamous face that you see in the crystal ball that wishes to lift the spirits was portrayed by an Imagineer of the same name, Leota Toombs.  

What an eerily appropriate name for this seance reader.  Toombs was asked by fellow Imagineer, Yale Gracey  to pose for the disembodied head and the face for Madam Leota had been unearthed.  But her voice had proven to be too high-pitched for the Madam.  The voice of all evil, Eleanor Audley was brought in to voice Leota and for many years, this was one of her most iconic roles.

As you dear mortals  can see,  Audley had the right tone to enhance the spookiness needed for this seance.  (And she's scarier than Maleficent).  However, these two wouldn't be the only two to  resurrect the good Madame to life because every Christmas as the inhabitants of Halloweentown invade the Mansion,  Kim Irvine possess the crystal ball following in her mother's beheading psychic traditions as she is the daughter of Toombs.  

   

  

And alas Audley has been replaced with a new voice actress for Leota is now voiced by Susanne Blakeslee, who you can hear in this Haunting Holiday version of the ride.

This witching woman has taken over many villainous roles including Lady Tremaine and Maleficent.  Indeed, she is the legacy voice for Audley.  But the most terrifying character she voices is Wanda from The Fairly Oddparents.  Unwrap your dead body around that one.   

LES: WOW! Two very creepy performances and voices to match. I commend them for finding faces and also voices, for one without the other would be ordinary.

Personality

Moviefan12: We take to the script known as the Disney Wiki to get a feel on Leota's personality and digging through some the dust, we discover that she is shrouded in mystery.  Leaving others to interpret to their whim.  In the Slave Labor Graphics comic, the Madame is a spirit that is unaware that she has died.  She had first come to the Mansion in this continuity after falling for William Gracey, the namesake of Gracey Manor, she is a woman scorned and caused her to place a curse on the Manor that would bring about spirits and when the Mansion was filled with 1,000 spirits. A terrible thing would happen.  She was killed by Gracey by snapping her neck  and she was left to her crystal ball to perform the seance that would bring ghosts from around the globe to Gracey Manor.    

Now as we shall discuss, this will not be Leota's only appearance in comics and  there have been other takes on the famous Madame in other media that we shall cover as we creep along.  And while I like the story given to Leota in the Slave Labor Graphics, I prefer how Madam Leota is presented in the Mansion because as you pass her by, you wonder how she ended up how she is.  Her being shrouded in mystery makes her a more enticing character.  

LES: Absolutely. She is very mysterious…and that’s what makes her so effective on the ride. You go on the Haunted Mansion ride to see the spooks and experience the macabric atmosphere. It’s more effective not to know the background of all the characters. The murderous bride?…don’t need to know anything more about her…Gracey?…nice house he has?..had?…yeah, don’t need to know anything more about him….Madame Leota?…didn’t even need to know her name! I just like to be creeped out on the ride, you know?

Moviefan12: The mysterious Madame has one of the most mystifying moments in the Mansion.  Now, we shall give our reading on her Scare In The Mansion.

Scare In The Mansion

Moviefan12: Now Les, seeing as you were so ecstatic about our beheaded Madame. Why don't you go over her Scare In The Mansion. 

LES: It’s really something. You’re rolling through the room in your doom-mobile and you hear her voice before you see her. She’s chanting like a witch going over a recipe for contacting the departed from beyond the grave, and then the carriage swings around and you see the crystal ball with the floating head in the middle of it and you can then see she’s the one speaking the awesome seance script. As you roll around the ball, her head, that’s white with various rainbow colors running through her smoky visage, keeps it’s orientation so you can see it’s 3 dimensional(Before I knew it was done with a hologram((And this ride came out years before the general public was shown holograms, which made it even cooler)) this blew my mind with it’s awesomeness). As she comes to the part about music, on cue, these floating instruments in glowing neon float by to play a bizarre tune…and before you know it, you’re rolling into the next room. I don’t know about you…but I WANT TO STAY IN THAT ROOM TO HEAR THE REST OF IT! Madame Leota is one of the 3 best things in the Haunted Mansion.

Moviefan12: There isn't much more that I can add to this visit from the great beyond.  Now, we shall move on to her Scares Outside The Mansion.

Scares Outside The Mansion


Moviefan12:  Now just as our Hitchhiking ghoulies,  Madame Leota also has quite a few scares outside the Mansion.  Let's start with the most terrifying appearance that the poor Madame was drug through.

That not so happy haunt will face its execution soon.  Now before we head off the property, there is one place we must look at located within Magic Kingdom at Disney World.  Madame Leota's old abode, Memento Mori was discovered in 2014.

It houses many of her belongings from when she was still a part of the living.  And there, you can even find a portrait of the lovely Madame.  

And here you can see the Madame as she was as a part of the living.  However, it is said that from time to time that the spirit of Leota visits her old haunt to check on her belongings.  Now, there are other appearances that the good Madame has made of late such as in Marvel's Disney Kingdom comic and in Epic Mickey's Wasteland in Lonesome Manor renamed Madame Leona.  Keep an eye peeled out as The Creature and I will be travelling to the Wasteland to visit Lonesome Manor in the future. 

 




Now finally, we will move onto What She Brings To The Mansion


What She Brings To The Mansion


Moviefan12: Madame Leota brings one of the greatest moments to the Mansion and remains a woman that is shrouded in mystery.  Very little is known of her past nor do we need to know it as she is more effective  by not knowing anything about her.



LES: Agreed. Until that horrendous Eddie Murphy film….SHUDDER!…I didn’t even know her name as Madame Leota….to me, she was the mysterious witch inside the crystal ball who contacted the dead….what more do you need for a haunted mansion ride?