{"id":228525,"date":"2026-04-12T11:24:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-12T11:24:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/228525\/"},"modified":"2026-04-12T11:24:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-12T11:24:10","slug":"disney-cruise-line-helps-a-florida-elementary-school-pull-off-its-first-ever-theater-performance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/228525\/","title":{"rendered":"Disney Cruise Line helps a Florida elementary school pull off its first-ever theater performance"},"content":{"rendered":"

Endeavor Elementary had never put on a musical before. The school on the Space Coast didn\u2019t even have a drama teacher on staff.<\/p>\n

With some Disney magic, the spotlight shone on Endeavor students for its first-ever musical last month.<\/p>\n

Principal Christine Murphy was the unexpected director.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Her day job was leading the Cocoa school of 725 students who sometimes faced tough challenges related to coming from low income backgrounds. Endeavor relied on community partnerships so students could access a dentist or visit the school\u2019s health clinic to make sure all their needs were being met.<\/p>\n

Murphy knew nothing about theater.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cMy performance experiences stopped in fifth grade with chorus,\u201d Murphy said. \u201cI\u2019m a principal. I have no skillset.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Endeavor was given an extraordinary opportunity.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It won a Disney Musicals in Schools<\/a> grant to get free performance licensing rights for \u201c101 Dalmatians.\u201d <\/p>\n

Going even further, Disney Cruise Line<\/a> employees helped students sew costumes and paint the sets. Murphy was coached along the way, getting online resources on Theater 101. Endeavor Elementary<\/a> was only about 12 miles from Disney Cruise Line\u2019s Cape Canaveral Port so about 50 Disney employees adopted the school to guide Endeavor through the creative process.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur goal there was to inspire our next generation of creatives and performing artists,\u201d said Q Jones, senior manager of corporate social responsibility for Disney Cruise Line, as the entertainment company invests in initiatives to support the arts in schools. <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The work began. Parents signed permission slips. Auditions took place in late 2025 and the 45 students in grades 3-6 were picked for the cast. Several times a week, they rehearsed for nearly two hours at a time.<\/p>\n

Just like Murphy, the students needed to be convinced they could star in the school\u2019s first-ever show.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cNone of our students when we started this knew what the experience was going to entail. They didn\u2019t know much about musicals. They didn\u2019t know what it was going to look like, sound like,\u201d Murphy said.<\/p>\n

Other children were eager for stardom.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It was clear who was going to play Cruella de Vil, the eccentric villain with the black-and-white hair and a fierce hatred of puppies. One fifth-grader had the swagger to pull it off.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe is Cruella 24\/7,\u201d Murphy said. \u201cShe has pizzazz and sass all day long.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Image via Disney.<\/p>\n

Geneva Gandy, an active parent at the school, had longed for the school to finally offer theater.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cTo see this was like a dream come true honestly,\u201d Gandy said.<\/p>\n

Gandy\u2019s two daughters Cheyenne, 10, and Giavonni, 9, practiced their lines at home while their young brother danced the choreography with them.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s an all-dog alert!\u201d the silly Giavonni repeated over and over.<\/p>\n

Cheyenne, the more serious one, directed Giavonni\u00a0to get the delivery right and start over.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was an all-dog alert every day at our house,\u201d their mother said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Cheyenne worried about making mistakes. She took failure hard.<\/p>\n

She had been cast as one of the dogs helping the Dalmatian on their journey.<\/p>\n

Could she remember her part?<\/p>\n

Her mother assured Cheyenne, \u201cYou can do hard things.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, their school principal remained on the front lines and was sometimes whisked away in the middle of musical rehearsals to deal with problems. Other school staff stepped up to take over during Murphy\u2019s absence.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were moments of fear and moments of \u2018Oh my gosh are we actually going to be able to pull this off,\u2019\u201d Murphy said as she worried the costumes looked too messy or the students missed their cues or the set wasn\u2019t quite right.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Opening night loomed closer.<\/p>\n

The student actors were invited to go on board the Disney Wish<\/a> and met with the Disney performers and behind the scenes crew that brought the ship\u2019s shows to life. The kids peppered them with questions. What do you do if you forget the words of the song? What\u2019s it like to perform on stage for the first time? How do you handle stage fright?<\/p>\n

The reassurances were what the students needed to hear. Disney quieted the fears in Murphy\u2019s head too.<\/p>\n

After months of rehearsals, the final pieces of the show were coming together.\u00a0<\/p>\n

One boy, who played Pongo, had started out shy, his voice a whisper. Now, he spoke confidently and loudly.<\/p>\n

Murphy broke down and cried during the dress rehearsal when she saw the show, both imperfect and perfect.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was beautiful,\u201d Murphy said.<\/p>\n

The Disney Cruise Line employees who helped the students get ready sat in the audience cheering and passed out flowers after the practice run.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Image via Disney.<\/p>\n

The show\u2019s grand public debut took place in the nearby high school on a real stage complete with lights, a curtain and a green room for the students backstage.<\/p>\n

The children performed, dancing and singing the songs they learned. <\/p>\n

Cruella blew kisses to the crowd during the show\u2019s standing ovation.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Murphy watched her students growing up, like Cheyenne, who had been so nervous she would make a misstep. Afterward Cheyenne grinned ear to ear, almost speechless that she had done it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThey have more confidence in themselves, in their abilities,\u201d Murphy said. \u201cThey\u2019re willing to try new things.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Endeavor Elementary had never put on a musical before. The school on the Space Coast didn\u2019t even have…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":228526,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[102768,39396,6859,1542,102769,102770,28,30,29,312],"class_list":["post-228525","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-101-dalmatians","tag-brevard-public-schools","tag-disney","tag-disney-cruise-line","tag-disney-wish","tag-endeavor-elementary","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-space-coast"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228525","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=228525"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228525\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/228526"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=228525"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=228525"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=228525"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}