[raspberry, humming]
[Whetsell] For me, it never fails.
Every day I get that little bit of nervous butterfly right before I enter.
I'm about to go do something really amazing for a bunch of people.
I wanna make sure that people are really connecting with Dory.
I mean, she's so beloved.
[harmonizing]
I'm Katie Whetsell.
I'm a principal performer here at Disney's Animal Kingdom.
I play Dory in Finding Nemo - The Musical.
We're here backstage at Disney's Animal Kingdom,
[chuckles] back behind Theater in the Wild.
It's really good for me to just be out here
doing a lot of forward-placed vocal warm-ups just to kind of get myself ready.
'Cause I like to warm up not too far out from the show
but also not right up against it
so it gives my voice time to, sort of, acclimate.
Getting all clipped in, ready for rehearsal.
So I always knew that working for Disney was going to be part of my journey.
And I, sort of, settle in just to make sure
that I'm in the right position.
But for our purposes, this is where we start for our rehearsal.
I actually auditioned for Nemo specifically,
I wanna say, four or five times.
It was overwhelming
that I've been entrusted with this role and this show.
When I came in, I was not a puppeteer,
so I-- I really had to learn that skill from the ground up.
These are the-- the gears that we use. This controls her eyes.
Look, so she can flutter her eyes at you.
I am puppeteering. I am singing. I am acting.
I am ensuring that everything is set up properly for my flips.
I don't even really fit through these wires.
So you're also-- you're just constantly trying to make sure
that the puppet fits through when you're...
when you're doing your thing.
Stay awake now.
Everything will be okay.
I'm a performer because I love to tell stories,
and I love for those stories to, hopefully, affect people
in really amazing ways.
Let's do this.
From the moment I enter, it's, you know, zero to 60 in 0.2 seconds.
The reason why we do theater is because
it's about doing it in front of a live audience.
Being able to actually have a human-to-human connection.
To be able to see that they really believed
and invested in the fact that I was Dory up there.
And to be able to really see their enjoyment,
that, to me, is worth everything.
That's why we do what we do.
[cheering, applause continues]
This is probably one of my favorite places on Walt Disney World property
because of what it means for me and for my family
and my journey, sort of, with Disney.
Um... [smacks lips]
Years and years ago, when I was 14,
we came here for our one, sort of, big family vacation with my mom.
The reason why it was so important for us was because my mom was sick
with ovarian cancer at the time.
And growing up, my mom had always dreamed of going to Disney,
but, because of her family circumstances, that wasn't possible.
So we'd had a really amazing day at Magic Kingdom.
We decided to stay for the SpectroMagic Light Parade.
We sort of set up her wheelchair along the side of the parade route,
and so she was bald and wearing a scarf.
So the parade is starting,
and we're watching these beautiful colors just sort of glide by us,
and-- it seems like it was out of nowhere,
but this really beautiful butterfly comes gliding up to my mom.
She put her hand on my mom's shoulder
and just smiled at her, this really beautiful smile.
In that moment, the way that she smiled at her,
it was almost like this dream that my mom had had as a child.
You could almost see her revert in a way.
It really felt like, in that moment,
they had given her a piece of childhood that she never got to have.
And, so, in that moment, I really kind of realized
that working for Disney had to be part of my journey.
I think seeing that look on my mother's face
drove home how important it is
to have a place that is entirely, simply about joy.
To now be able to give those memories to other families is...
It's everything to me.