Birds turn it ‘Up!’ at Animal Kingdom show

When you’re performing with birds, you have to wing it. That was even true on the debut day for “Up! A Great Bird Adventure,” a show staged at Disney’s Animal Kingdom theme park.

The production, revamped to include the Russell and Dug characters from the Disney-Pixar movie “Up,” had a few mild bumps courtesy of birds — especially those hens — with minds of their own.

“It’s always a little unpredictable,” said Laura Offerdahl, an executive producer with Disney Parks Live Entertainment, before the show opened to the public Sunday.

“That’s actually kind of like one of my favorite things — when they misbehave. It’s fun, and it’s endearing,” she said.

Those hiccups may force the show’s human performers to fly by the seat of their pants at times. But our crew — Anika, the caretaker and descendent of a queen, and Scott, a “bird whisperer” — seemed prepared with coping mechanisms, including lines like “that’s hen-tertainment.”

Even Russell, the costumed character/Wilderness Explorer, coped with off-script shenanigans when a crowned crane named Frasier pecked at his orange shoelaces.

Birds pop up all over the theater, formerly the home to “Flights of Wonder,” which closed at the end of 2017. In addition to Frasier and the wayward hens, we saw a parrot, a trumpeter hornbill that caught a grape mid-air, an African fish eagle, a toucan, a peacock and Hope, a bald eagle.

I liked Hope, a beauty of a bird, if a bit of a poser. And the parrot’s almostslow-motion rendition of “Old McDonald” was my top laugh of the day. (This took three years to achieve, we’re told.)

There’s a smidge of audience interaction, with birds flying between arms and overhead. And, yes, birds being birds, there was a dropping incident. I’m confident that wasn’t one woman’s top laugh of the day.

The show is aimed squarely at children. I mean, adults don’t need “wingspan” explained — although I laughed when Dug held his dog ears out to demonstrate wingspan.

Others laughed when Dug is asked what Kevin, a bird in “Up,” looked like. He responded enthusiastically with “Oh, I know. A bird!” The audience also goes into awwww mode when the parrot meows.

Although the characters loosely fit into Animal Kingdom’s theming, I got a little weary of them. Then I started thinking about Mickey Mouses with moving mouths and how I’ve taken them for granted. Remember how Mickey and friends used to just shake their heads around when “talking”? That’s where Russell is now.

“Up! A Great Bird Adventure” is performed multiple times daily. The show lasts about 25 minutes, “depending on the birds,” Offerdahl says.

dbevil@orlandosentinel.com or 407-420-5477; Twitter: @ThemeParks