Oriental DreamWorks offers glimpse of ‘Dream Center’ in Shanghai

It could become Shanghai’s version of the Broadway theater district in New York or the Champs-Elysees in Paris.

At least that’s the grand vision of Oriental DreamWorks, the joint venture between Glendale-based DreamWorks Animation andChina’s largest media companies that unveiled plans this week for a $3.1-billion entertainment and cultural center in the heart of Shanghai.

The six-block area, called “Dream Center,” will include shops, offices, cinemas, theaters and restaurants on a largely undeveloped parcel of prime waterfront land.

Here’s a video presentation on the planned development: https://www.dreamworksanimation.com/videos/dream_center_rendering.mp4

Expected to be be completed by 2016, the district will encompass Oriental DreamWorks’s new animation studio, which will release animated TV shows and movies in China and for the foreign market.

The studio’s first release will be a third installment of “Kung Fu Panda,” the first Chinese co-production for a major Hollywood animated movie. Not surprisingly, one of the attractions in the Dream Center will be a themed Kung Fu Panda area.

Although not a theme park, DreamWorks will face competition from its Burbank rival, Walt Disney Co., which is opening a $4.4-billion Disneyland theme park in Shanghai, also in 2016.

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