{"id":7587,"date":"2025-10-17T01:45:12","date_gmt":"2025-10-17T01:45:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/7587\/"},"modified":"2025-10-17T01:45:12","modified_gmt":"2025-10-17T01:45:12","slug":"viral-walt-disney-world-photographer-honored-with-huge-award","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/7587\/","title":{"rendered":"Viral Walt Disney World photographer honored with huge award"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Viral Viral Disney World photographer wins huge award<\/a> <\/p>\n

Willie Jackson is famous at Walt Disney World and on TikTok. He’s a PhotoPass photographer at Disney’s Hollywood Studios. Last year, he was awarded Walt Disney World’s “most complimented cast member.” This year, Jackson has received another honor, one of the highest honors a Cast Member can receive: the Walt Disney Legacy Award.<\/p>\n

WALT DISNEY WORLD, Fla. – It is hard not to smile when Walt Disney World PhotoPass Photographer Willie Jackson<\/a> is looking back at you.<\/p>\n

Jackson was honored as the “Most Complimented Cast Member<\/a>” by Disney last year. Since then, he’s gone viral on social media by all the people he interacts with every day at Disney’s Hollywood Studios theme park.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

The backstory:<\/p>\n

Walt Disney World PhotoPass Photographer Willie Jackson has gained popularity for his infectious smile and engaging interactions with guests.<\/p>\n

“I like to be a director or producer, and when I get guests to me, they really are my actors,” Jackson told FOX 35 in February 2024. “I try my very best to show them certain areas they can pose.”<\/p>\n

He’s been working at Walt Disney World for more than 14 years \u2013 the last 7 in the PhotoPass department.<\/p>\n

CLICK TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX LOCAL APP<\/a><\/p>\n

“Like the young people always tell me, say, \u2018Mr. Willie, you blowing up the internet.\u2019 I say, ‘I’m blowing up, what again?’ You blowing up internet. Everybody know y’all, like really?<\/p>\n

This year, Jackson received another honor. In fact, it’s one of the highest honors a Cast Member can receive.<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

Surrounded by his colleagues \u2013 cameras in hand \u2013 Jackson was surprised with the Walt Disney Legacy Award.<\/p>\n

“Our legacy award winner is our very own Willie Jackson!” read one of his colleagues, followed by dozens cheering him on.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I have joy and I have happiness and I bring all that together when I come here. See here, this is not a job to me. It’s like a playground and on the playground, I just come here to have fun,” he told FOX 35’s Stephanie Buffamonte.<\/p>\n

Disney World has been honoring several cast members with the Walt Disney Legacy Award. Less than 1% of Cast Members receive the distinction.\u00a0<\/p>\n

SIGN-UP FOR FOX 35’S BREAKING NEWS, DAILY NEWS NEWSLETTERS<\/a><\/p>\n

The Source: This story was written based on information shared by Walt Disney World Resort.<\/p>\n

Walt Disney World News<\/a>Heartwarming News<\/a>Viral<\/a>Florida News<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Viral Disney World photographer wins huge award Willie Jackson is famous at Walt Disney World and on TikTok.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7588,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[47,6043,115,139,141,140,2411,628,8065,8064],"class_list":{"0":"post-7587","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-orlando","8":"tag-fl","9":"tag-heartwarming","10":"tag-news","11":"tag-orlando","12":"tag-orlando-headlines","13":"tag-orlando-news","14":"tag-theme-parks","15":"tag-us","16":"tag-viral","17":"tag-walt-disney-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7587","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=7587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7587\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7588"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}