Dinosaurs will come to life this weekend in Hartford with Jurassic World Live at the XL Center.
Attendees will be able to see their favorite dinosaurs from the Jurassic World franchise live and in person Friday through Sunday.
“Everybody’s seen these on film a hundred times,” tour coordinator Cassandra Rose said. “When you come out to see the show, it’s right there, it’s live, it’s on the floor in your home town.”
Jurassic World Live centers around a new character, Jeannie. Jeannie is a Trodon, a highly intelligent dinosaur species.
Rose said an asset containment unit tries to capture Jeannie, but a team of scientists try to save her.
“We’ve got really incredible action,” she said. “We’ve got pyrotechnics and explosions, we’ve got flights, we’ve got Pteranodons coming and picking people up off the ground and lifting them up into the sky.”
The show features 18 dinosaurs, including eight different species, who will even interact with both the performers and the crowd. The tour launched in 2019.
“In our VIP pods, you sit right next to them and they’ll get right up on those berms and they’ll bark at you and snap at you,” Rose said.
It took two years to create the dinosaurs using the same molds used to produce the creatures in the Jurassic World franchise. Jurassic World Live also features jeeps, motorcycles and other props featured in the franchise.
Producers of the live show had to get approval from Steven Speilberg, director of the original Jurassic Park movie in 1993 and sequel The Lost World: Jurassic Park in 1997.
Performers spent three months in Palmetto, Florida, learning how to bring the dinosaurs to life, first using hand puppets before graduating to rigs to learn how to move the creations and show emotion.
They eventually practiced in the actual dinosaurs, which can weigh as much as 140 pounds.
“We have world class stunt people, world class break dancers, martial artists — I mean, people from every background,” Rose said.
The performers then spent two weeks practicing in Vancouver, Canada, and hold rehearsals every day.
The tour includes a team of roughly 90 people, including 30 performers and 30 crew members. Rose said as many as 28 trucks bring the show from city to city, compared to a normal of five to seven trucks for a touring production.
Jurassic World Live also offers a pre-show event where attendees can see a jeep, triceratops and other props from the show, as well as Bumpy, the main character in the animated Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous series.
Rose has been on the tour since in launched in 2019, originally controlling the show’s automation.
She said she’s always enjoyed the reactions when the dinosaurs interact with the crowd.
“Every time I get to hear the crowds going wild, I get to hear the kids screaming and just losing their minds,” she said. “These are things people old and young love,”
Tickets are still available through Ticketmaster. Show times include:
Friday at 7 p.m.;
Saturday at 11 a.m., 3 p.m. and 7 p.m.; and
Sunday at noon and 4 p.m.
