Start Your Engines!

Ladies and Gentlemen, after months of obsessively checking the Disney International Programs website for updates, the applications for the January 2015, J1 Australia & New Zealand Cultural Exchange Program are finally open!!!!!

(Wow...the program has a very long name, doesn't it?)

So a couple of days ago I checked the Disney Programs site and much to my excitement the Jan 2015 applications were finally open so yesterday I sat down to write my application!  It was very exciting, I can tell you.  I'm not going to write much here, because I'm going to do a more information focussed post soon outlining each step of the process.  I'll try to keep it concise and easy to follow so that future applicants can use it as a bit of a guide since I've had to do a fair bit of searching to find relevant information for Aussie applicants.

So keep checking back and feel free to leave a comment or ask a question if you would like.  I'll get back to you asap.

The power of Disney.

A friend of mine shared the following article on Facebook this morning and I sat down with my morning cup of coffee to enjoy what I assumed would be a lovely, feel-good Disney anecdote; however what I got was so much more.  I am going to say very little about the story, rather I will link it here for you to read yourself, and if you read nothing else that I post on this blog, I recommend you take the time to read this.  It's a little long and you will no doubt need a box of tissues, but it is more than worth it.

New York Times - Reaching My Autistic Son Through Disney

Grumpy to Snow White in 0.22 Seconds

So the worlds second largest Fringe Festival is happening at the moment and amongst the business of my final year of studies, I'm excited to be a performing artist this year!  The gospel choir I sing in has a one-nite-only concert next weekend at the Adelaide Fringe Festival.  If you're ever in the area, the Adelaide Festival season is incredible, featuring several festivals around late summer/early autumn (Aussie seasons here so February - April).  Arguably the feather in my little city's artistic cap is the Adelaide Fringe Festival, an amazing Fringe Festival second only to the Edinborough Fringe Festival.  I won't ramble on about it but if you get the chance I'd seriously recommend coming to Adelaide one year to check it out.

Anyway, the point of this post is to talk about a Fringe show I went and saw on Thursday night.  How I found out about this show is kind of a cute story (in my opinion anyway).  I was doing a sort of pop-up promo performance with my choir at the 'Fringe Caravan', a temporary performance space set up in the city where Fringe Artists can do little 10-minute sets to promote their shows for free.  I was tired from the busy-ness of being back at school and just not having a great day and I'll be honest, I was pretty darn grumpy.  I was standing with my group waiting for our turn to perform, feeling sorry for myself and just wanting to go home and be an anti-social hermit when I hear this gorgeous male voice singing along to an acoustic guitar.  Considering where I was, this wasn't that much of a surprise or anything out of the ordinary - until the lyrics broke through my grumpy-pants-aura.  

"I wanna be where the people are, I wanna see, wanna see them dancing..."

Oh yes my friends.  This guy was standing there, bold as brass, singing Part of Your World from The Little Mermaid!!!  I swear I went from Grumpy to Snow White in 0.22 seconds!

Anywho...this guy finishes the song and then starts talking about how that was from his previous Fringe show  called 'The Disney Project'.  Obviously at this point I am completely enthralled and when he starts talking about his new show called 'The 90's Project' I've already decided to buy tickets (Have I mentioned my deep rooted love of 90's pop music?).  So I convinced/bullied a friend into coming with me and bought tickets for Thursday night's performance.  Mr. Ariel, which I have at this point dubbed him, performed as part of a 4-piece pub band and the 90 minute show was fantastic.  I mean I'm happy with a mixed tape of 90's songs but to listen to 4 very talented musicians performing some of my favourites live was just spectacular.   A bit of searching and a tip from my friend led me to Mr. Ariel's YouTube channel (His name is actually Max but I think Mr. Ariel suits him), where he has a whole bunch of videos of him singing covers of various songs and lo and behold! There is a playlist called...The Disney Project!!!!!

As a Disney nerd, this has made my week...well my festival really (well ok, performing has made my festival but this is a close second!) and I wanted to share the love with everyone (plus it is shameful that his vids don't have more hits) so go and check him out HERE!  

Amazing voice, great musician and Disney tunes - what are you waiting for? He's a rather handsome young chap too (Bit too young for me sadly! Hehehehe!), so really, it's a win-win-win situation.  Enjoy!

About Me!

I’m going a bit crazy with waiting for applications to open, so I thought I’d do an ‘About Me’ post if anyone is interested.  I will try to keep this as concise as possible, but I am a bit of a rambler and I’m worried this will get a bit long so I might just talk about myself here and then later on I might post a bit about my experience with Disney thus far.

My name is Rebecca (or Bec/Becca/Becky – take your pick!), I’m Australian, 30 years old and currently studying Costume for Performance at the Adelaide College of the Arts, which is the main Arts campus of TafeSA.  I’ve wanted to work in the theatre since I was about 15 years old, but never really felt like I had enough talent to make it work, so ended up going to University to become a primary school teacher instead.  I taught for a few years and even though I love working with kids, my heart just wasn’t in it.  So I ended up pursuing the dream I’d harboured for half my life and enrolled to study costuming.  I absolutely love costuming and designing and I’d like to one day work on a Disney Broadway show (preferably actually on Broadway but I’m not picky). 

Personality-wise I’m a self-confessed weirdo.  On the Myer-Briggs Type Indicator I’m an ENFP personality type, which actually explains a lot about me so go check that out if you want (and if you’ve never done Myers Briggs I’d recommend it – it’s by no means conclusive but it’s a good guideline for understanding yourself and other people).  But essentially I’m a very talkative, friendly, happy person.  I like to think the best of people and will be friends with anyone provided they’re nice.  I’m very independent and even though trying out unknown things often terrifies me, I love to just get in there and give it a go.

I love music, mostly singing (because I didn’t have the patience to master any of the other instruments I tried!).  I love reading and movies and a little bit of TV, but I also really love just going out and DOING things; which is why I love the idea of being at WDW, because there is just so much to DO.  It might sound a bit corny, but I love making memories.  Not in a sappy, romantic-comedy film sort of way, but in a “remember that time when…” sort of way, that always ends up in peals of laughter.  I very much believe in the idea that ‘only boring people lead boring lives’, and I want my life to be anything but boring.

A couple of quick facts about me: My favourite colour is green, my favourite food is toast, I love, love, LOVE coffee, my favourite Disney princess is Belle, I love musical theatre, I’m a Whovian (Dr. Who fan) and my first celebrity crush was on Indiana Jones/Harrison Ford when I saw ‘Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade’ at the Drive-In Movies when I was six years old!

Ok, that’s a general intro to me.  Probably not terribly interesting to anyone but it was fun to write all the same.  I’m planning to write a bit of a post about me and Disney later on, so stay tuned for that!

The Journey of a Thousand Miles...

Well ten thousand miles to be more accurate.  That's the approximate distance from Adelaide, my current city of Residence, to Orlando, Florida, where I hope to be living this time next year.

I am hoping to be accepted into the Disney International College Program, which would involve moving to Florida to live and work at the Walt Disney World Theme Parks and Resorts.  The program is open to university students and recent graduates from around the world and operates as a sort of paid internship program.  I plan to go into more detail about the program in future posts but for now I just want to introduce myself.

My name is Rebecca, although most people just call me Bec.  I am Australian and I'm in my final year of studying Costume for Performance and I hope to work in costume for live theatre.  My two big goals are to work on a big Broadway production (I'd be happy to be a dresser or to wash the costumes!) and to work as a costume designer.  Costuming is actually my second career, I used to be a primary school teacher, but when I found that teaching really wasn't what I wanted to do for the rest of my life, I decided to pursue my passion for live theatre.

Disney has always been a big part of my life and working for Disney has been something I've wanted for several years now (I might tell that story another time) and when I discovered the ICP I knew I wanted to go for it.  I started researching immediately and whilst I found heaps of information there wasn't a lot that was specific to Australians and there was even less for 'older' participants (I'm 30 years old).  So, I decided that I would try to record my application journey and if I get into the program I will blog my program experience too so that others might get some help from my experience.  I'm applying for the 2015 12 month program that starts in January 2015 but since applications aren't even open yet, I won't have much to say for a little while.  But I'll update as much as I can.

So welcome to my journey of ten thousand miles, that begins in Australia and hopefully ends in The Magic Kingdom!