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Costumed character


A costumed character wears a costume that usually (but not always) covers the performer's face. These range from theme park "walk-around" or "meetable" characters, the mascots of corporations, schools, or sports teams to novelty act performers. Some costumes cover the performer's face; others, especially those in theme parks, may leave the performer's face visible.

Costumed characters are a major feature of Walt Disney Parks and Resorts (Disney Parks), the world's largest operator of theme parks, where the most ubiquitous character is Mickey Mouse, but a wide variety of characters from different media franchises are portrayed at various parks. For example:

Other theme parks, as well as international expositions and fairs, create their own meetable characters.

Costumed characters are intended to add to the fantasy experience by enabling visitors to encounter and interact with fictional characters, such as mascots for a company or organization. The characters are portrayed by employees in costume. Some of the costumes merely consist of clothing and makeup (e.g. Cinderella, Anna and Elsa, Batman, Captain America), while those for non-human characters generally conceal the performer entirely and include a full-head/body mask (e.g. Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Goofy, Bugs Bunny and his crew, Scooby-Doo, The Minions, Felix the Cat, Godzilla, Woody Woodpecker, SpongeBob SquarePants and World Exposition characters such as Seymore D. Fair, Twipsy, and Haibao). A longstanding policy of Disney Parks is that the first category of characters, where the performer's face remains visible ("face" characters) are allowed to speak (usually on the basis of scripts carefully prepared in advance), while the second category of characters, where the face is covered ("fur" characters) are not allowed to speak and can only communicate through pantomime.


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Wikipedia

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