yeah stripping drywall off only works on interior walls unfortunately.
I've been eying the drywall on my staircase (I have a small house) and thinking how nice it'd be to pull that down... My house is so old too when I usually open up a wall I gain a ton of room because it's slat/plaster not just drywall.
I did my insert shelf on an interior wall that gained a large unsightly hole in it. It's my spare room where I kept a bed available for my niece/nephew but also it's turning more into an office and display area than anything, slowly but surely.
What if you did something like this Mike:
A single-figure deep display cabinet of sorts. I'm trying to think how to describe my idea, but basically tons of little compartments for just ONE figure. A grid pattern... Not sure on figure depths you're looking at, but my idea is basically all these little boxes and you make acrylic/plexi-glass covers for each "coffin" they fit in. Make it so the lid (the acrylic) is held down by rare earth magnets (VERY strong but tiny). These SHOULD allow the figure to rest against the acrylic, but at the same time you see them and can get them down individually any time you want just by prying open the lid... You could stain the wood whatever you wanted. I think it would look freakishly cool actually. Almost artsy.
Think of like a clear coffee table with something encased in it (flowers or whatever. I see different styles of that type of coffee table)... But this would just be on a tiny scale, upside down facing obviously since it'd be mounted to the ceiling, and you'd be able to open up and access what's inside obviously. Pick a "standard size" for the figures, some pine boards and plywood... The most expensive part would be the plexi-glass lids for each slot the figure rests in. They'd rest on their face, but ultimately that shouldn't hurt anything.
Damn that makes me wish I had angled ceilings in an upper room just to see how that looks! It'd be so weird, but so cool.