The dark truth about posting videos of us

A former Disney employee has revealed the dark side of online fame as a House of Mouse character actor.

TiKTok user Jill Beignet warned visitors about posting public videos on social media of employees while in character, claiming it could get them in serious trouble or sometimes even fired.

Beignet, who is now a travel agent, explained her reasoning behind the claim in a video which received more than 240,000 views.

According to the TikToker, people have been fired for “doing an amazing job,” and despite Disney characters being unionized, the company still sees them as “pretty expendable.”

“So if you’re causing problems in any way for the company, you’re just not worth it,” she explained.

Beignet alleged character performers have been terminated because they did something really “cute or fun,” but a manager saw the video and thought it broke “some rule” or it wasn’t in character. The ex-worker referred to the infamous Peter Pan incident from a few years ago where a character actor was reportedly fired after his performance attracted a lot of online views.

“There was this fantastic Peter Pan performer, and he went viral. As he got more and more internet famous, guests would come to the park and only want to see him as Peter Pan so if someone else was Peter Pan that day, they would get upset and complain,” she said.

“It became enough of an operational problem that he was either fired or Disney insisted that he quit or be fired, it’s not entirely clear.”

Other ex-employees have taken to TikTok to share similar stories, with TikTok user Sarah Daniels sharing a video earlier in the year explaining how tipping a Disney character could get them fired.

“If someone else sees it and the person keeps it, they get fired. If no one sees it and they keep it, they’re going to think about it for the rest of their life. This is not a tipped position,” she explained.

Beignet advised people to be careful when posting videos of Disney character actors online, urging people to set the video’s settings to “friends only.”

“The short version is if you post a video on social media of a Disney character doing just about anything and you don’t put it under a privacy setting, it might get them fired or at least in a lot of trouble,” she claimed. “Because at the end of the day, all Disney cast members are people. They have lives and families, and these jobs are how they provide for them.”

Beignet concluded the TikTok by saying that while she enjoyed her time as a Disney character performer, she admitted it was stressful at times.

“I loved my time as a Disney character performer in my college program. I would do it again in a heartbeat,” she said. “I did have constant anxiety and fear that I was gonna lose my job because of one interaction.”