It’s time to roll out the red carpet in Darling Harbour, Sydney. From May 2012 Australian and international celebrities will be lining up ready to be photographed, and getting ‘up close and personal’ with visitors….. when Merlin Entertainments (‘Merlin’) opens Madame Tussauds, Sydney, the company’s 6th Australian attraction, situated on the water’s edge at Aquarium Wharf, Darling Harbour.
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The AUD 14m, 1800 sq m attraction will be the 13th Madame Tussauds in the world and fourth in Asia Pacific - joining its highly successful sister attractions in Hong Kong, Shanghai, Bangkok.
Merlin promised to bring Madame Tussauds to Sydney when it acquired four of the City’s other top attractions earlier this year – Sydney Aquarium and Oceanworld Manly, and the soon to be relaunched WILD LIFE Sydney and Sydney Tower Eye and SKYWALK. The ultimate celebrity experience and world’s best known and most popular wax attraction, Merlin believes the new attraction will add a completely new dimension to the Sydney entertainment scene. In line with each of the other Madame Tussauds attractions, Madame Tussauds Sydney will also reflect the fun, and unique culture of Australia. Darling Harbour is already Sydney’s favour
ite leisure and entertainment area and Madame Tussauds is guaranteed to be a ‘must see’ attraction for both locals and visitors to the City.
Enter Madame Tussauds and you step into the world of the famous. The Sydney attraction will be home to local heroes like Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman who will be featured alongside other international A-listers like Johnny Depp and Lady Gaga; as well as politicians, literary and sports stars like Don Bradman, and many others – all bringing their own very special glamour and glitz to Sydney - thanks to Madame Tussauds. Amazing wax figures – so high quality and so lifelike that even the celebrities themselves do a double take when they see them – and all in stunning interactive themed sets designed to excite, amaze, and surprise, including some with unique animated features!
With no bars, ropes or barriers around the figures visitors will have no problem believing that they really are standing beside, or even ‘acting/competing’ with, their heroes in some of the exciting interactive parts of the exhibit which have become such a popular part of what Madame Tussauds offers – and the photographs taken with favourite stars are a special memory for ever.
The result of 200 years of expertise and painstaking research every figure takes Madame Tussauds’ gifted sculptors a minimum of three months to make. Most contemporary figures are also produced following sittings with the celebrities themselves – and talks are already well advanced with a number of Australian icons. They are the result of hundreds of separate measurements, hours matching skin tone, eye and hair colour – with every individual hair inserted separately. Celebrities and film studio wardrobe departments often supply clothing for their figures, or designers will reproduce significant or iconic outfits as exact replicas, only for Madame Tussauds. Inclusion in one of the 13 Madame Tussauds attractions around the world is seen as a huge honour and recognition of an individual’s contribution, status and achievement.
Commenting, Merlin Entertainments Midway Managing Director Glenn Earlam said: “Madame Tussauds Sydney is a very exciting development for Merlin. Sydney has a dynamic and very exciting leisure and entertainment scene, and when we acquired the four existing top attractions in the City we believed that they had great potential for development, and that is already proving the case. Madame Tussauds is the obvious one of our global brands to bring here first, and we believe will not only be very complementary to our other attractions but also add a new dimension to Darling Harbour. We have received a great deal of support here since our arrival, including working very closely with our landlords the Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority to move the project forward. We hope too that it will be just the first of several major new investments in this amazing City.”
As well as Asia Pacific Madame Tussauds attractions can be found successfully operating in London, New York, Hollywood, Berlin, Amsterdam, Washington DC, Las Vegas, Blackpool and Vienna.