Rick Rothschild

Rick Rothschild is a producer, director, and film maker, blending a unique set of entertainment skills developed in the world of theater, media, Disney theme parks and museums. With over 50 years of experience, Rothschild brings strong creative perspective together with deep technical knowledge to provide both vision and direction.

Along with the responsibility of creatively directing and producing over 25 separate Disney attractions during a 30 plus year tenure as a creative executive at Walt Disney Imagineering, Rick led and participated in a variety of concept development teams that have created special venue film based attractions, along with theme parks and other resort, recreation and immersive experience related business lines.

Rothschild’s first directorial role with Disney was leading the creation of The American Adventure for EPCOT Center in 1982. In 1987, Rick was named Executive Producer, Entertainment Center Projects, responsible for helping guide the planning of several Disney entertainment/retail centers, including Pleasure Island, which opened at Walt Disney World Resort in 1989. Other theme park projects have included three original attractions for Tokyo DisneySea, Alien Encounter and a new Hall of Presidents edition. During the 1990’s, Rick headed the design team that developed Golden State land, the central third of Disney’s California Adventure theme park, and was the film writer/director for Soarin’ over California, a thrilling and unique IMAX-scale flying ride experience where guests “hang glide” over dramatic Golden State scenery projected in high-definition on an 80 foot dome. He led teams that brought other popular 3-D experiences to Disney theme parks, including It’s Tough to be a Bug!, Honey, I Shrunk the Audience and Mickey’s PhilharMagic.

After retiring from Walt Disney Imagineering, Rothschild founded FAR Out! Creative Direction to offer his creative and producing services. Through FAR Out! Rick returned to WDI to help bring additional attractions to Disney theme parks around the world, including Star Tours – The Adventures Continue and Nemo and Friends – SeaRider at Tokyo DisneySea, In the twenty-eight years since the Theme Entertainment Association (TEA) was established, 8 projects that Rick directed have been recognized with the THEA Award for Outstanding Achievement.

FlyOver Canada, a next generation “flying ride” large format film attraction that opened in Vancouver BC in June 2013, engaged Rick’s directorial film talents as well as overall Creative Director. FlyOver America opened in summer of 2015 at Mall of America, followed by FlyOver Iceland in Reykjavik, Iceland 2019, and FlyOver Las Vegas in September 2021.

As overall creative director/producer, Rick opened Kaka’s Ocean Adventure, a state of the art 1000 motion seat 5D immersive 180º ride theater attraction at Chimelong Ocean Kingdom, in Hengqin, China in June 2015. This attraction was honored with a THEA Award for Outstanding Achievement in 2017.

In November 2012, Rick completed a 2-year term as President of the TEA and continues as an active member of the association’s Past Presidents Committee. Rick is also an active member of the Producers Guild of America, the Visual Effects Society and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Rick received his degree with honors in Theater Design from Lawrence University in Wisconsin and attended the MFA Theater Arts program at UCLA. He worked in Los Angeles, Minneapolis, New York, Spokane and Ohio area on over 100 productions as both a scenic and lighting designer prior to joining Disney in 1978.