General News
3 July, 2026
Local kids bring Disney magic to stage
Maryborough will see some Disney magic through Maryborough Theatre Company's junior production this weekend.
Local juniors will bring magic to Maryborough this weekend with their performance of the coming-of-age Disney production Dare to Dream Jr.
Twenty-five junior members of the Maryborough Theatre Company will take to the stage in a performance that hits close to home for the young cast and crew.
Local kids from nine to 15 years old will play an eager group of trainees on their first day at a fictional Walt Disney Imagineering Studio.
Together they discover their dreams, not unlike the people on stage, who are living their own journeys of self-discovery.
The production’s director Hannah Matters, who is 21 years old, has been with the theatre company since she was nine.
After directing The Spongebob Musical, she thought she was done, but saw this production needed her.
“Someone had to put their hand up or the juniors didn’t get a show,” she said.
Ms Matters said it was important they did because theatre was an “outlet” for local kids.
“It’s nourishing and it allows them to be themselves,” she said.
She said the kids involved came from many local schools including Maryborough Education Centre, Highview College, and even Carisbrook, Dunolly and St Augustine’s primary schools.
“This is truly a junior production, that we obviously couldn’t do without the support of all the parents, sponsors, and everyone from our company backstage putting sets together, transporting equipment, and doing the hard yards so that our younger members can experience the full breadth of putting on a show of this calibre,” she said.
Yet, like many shows, it was a production that didn’t lack its challenges.
Ms Matters said there were licensing delays, loss of production members, and even the words ‘break a leg’ taken too seriously.
“Luckily everything worked out but we were a bit like, uh oh, what are we going to do,” she said.
“It’s stressful at first and then you have to think creatively about how we can get around it.”
In the end the production was delayed from late May to this weekend.
“We could tell the cast were really really stressed,” she said.
“Kids were coming up to me going ‘are we going to have a show’.”
Watching their final rehearsal earlier this week, Ms Matters said she was proud of what they accomplished.
“It has been such an honour to watch them starting out not knowing any of the songs or dances and then watching them on that stage,” she said.
“It’s beautiful to see the future of musical theatre as they grow and blossom.”
The production opens at Highview College’s theatre today, July 3, at 7 pm. A matinee show will also run tomorrow, July 4, at 2 pm.
Further information can be found on Maryborough Theatre Company’s Facebook page.