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Imagine this: you score a one-year creative marketing internship at Disney Plus in London, where you get to work with all your favorite content using all of your creative skills. You get to pitch, write, develop and edit multiple spots across several campaigns. And then you wrap up this opportunity by winning Best New Talent at GEMA Europe 2025. 

That was the experience of Rhea Haynes, a creative intern at Disney Plus in London and a student at Falmouth University in Cornwall. During her time at Disney Plus, she created social media spots for the streaming service as well as a “full fat” brand spot, according to her team, that’s a master class in editing. 

Read on to meet Haynes for yourself. The future is bright for this one! 

‍Spotlight: What led you to apply for the internship at Disney Plus?

‍Haynes: I've always loved Disney as a company. I really enjoy the films, the content and Disney Plus as a platform. I wanted to do something creative, but more audio/visual (AV)-led and more editing heavy. I also knew I didn't want to be an editor sitting in an editorial suite for hours. This role was advertised as a creative campaign internship, so you're working on marketing campaigns but from the creative standpoint. It was a great opportunity to experience a wide range of different parts of being a creative and seeing behind the scenes. I think that was what drew me to it. I knew that the Disney internships in general were very hands-on.They let you get involved in the roles, and you don't just sit on the sidelines and make coffees. You get to learn a lot from everyone.

‍Spotlight: So it wasn't like you necessarily wanted to go into marketing, per se, but as you were looking for an internship, you were drawn to the platform, you were drawn to the content, and you were drawn to what you would be able to do.

‍Haynes: Yes, the creative editing side of it. I didn't really realize the full extent of marketing until I started in the role. I do find the marketing side of things really interesting and I think it’s good because as a creative, it gives you a base for what you’re doing. You're not just being creative for the sake of it. You're thinking about what audiences you're targeting and what kind of quotas you're trying to meet.

‍Spotlight: Did you already know how to edit and how to do what needed to be done for the campaigns you worked on?

‍Haynes: I already had quite a good basis because I did an extended diploma in film and television for my A-levels at BoomSatsuma, so I already knew Adobe Premiere and After Effects. It meant I could really hit the ground running. 

‍Spotlight: You worked on several campaigns, one of which was a “Happy Birthday” piece for the fifth anniversary of Disney Plus. What was the creative process for that?

Haynes: We were briefed to create assets to celebrate the five-year anniversary of Disney Plus, so it was a fun celebration-filled theme. I wanted to create a happy birthday sing-along with different clips to bring in as much content as we could. The process was a lot of clip-pulling from many different shows and series, and then putting clips in and pulling clips out. It was a big jigsaw puzzle, the  process of fitting it all together over quite a few months.

‍Spotlight: How does it work to pull the clips? It seems impossible to watch all of that content to find all of the clips that you need. 

Haynes: We have software by the Video Genome Project, where we can type in phrases and words, and then it will go through all the content and pull out where people have said that. But even typing in “happy birthday,” you end up with like 2,000 results. So then you've got to refine it. You can set it to just gather clips from ‘Modern Family,’ for example, or from a certain film. And then you might find that certain clips actually don’t fit very well, because someone is saying something in the wrong tone or it doesn’t quite fit the timing. 

I particularly enjoyed the juxtaposition of some of the characters bouncing off of each other, like having The Simpsons next to Kim Kardashian. I think that’s where I found the fun in it, just being a bit random and bonkers. 

It probably took three months from start to finish. It ended up being used on Instagram Stories and in an internal email to staff to celebrate the anniversary.

Spotlight: You also did some social pieces that were submitted with Disney Plus’ entry for you for Best New Talent. Can you talk about the creative process for both of those? 

‍Haynes: The texting spot was for our long-running-series campaign. We targeted three different long-running series and promoted them in a way that made them feel like they were integrated into your phone. Everything from that campaign felt like it was integrated with what we're all used to seeing, like notifications, and the way your phone looks. The text-message idea was inspired by the look of Apple’s iMessage.

Spotlight: Did you do everything to create these spots, from writing the copy to editing the video?

Haynes: On this team, when people come up with and pitch their concepts for social, they do everything. So you might mock up the graphics, write the copy and do the editing, all for your one spot. 

You get the chance as creative intern to try everything, which has been great. I would mock up the graphics myself first, and then worked with the graphics team to polish them up. You really get to see the whole process from start to finish. 

Spotlight: Did the complexity of the process just to do social campaigns surprise you at all?

Haynes: Yes, the amount of original ideas that go into it, how it gets slimmed down, and the amount of people involved, actually all really surprised me. I take it for granted now, but I thought it would be one team who does everything that you see, but the marketing team is divided into all of these little teams. It’s an operation that you, as the consumer, don't see. And everything has to align to Disney’s overall brand as well, which is super interesting.

Spotlight: You were awarded Best New Talent at GEMA Europe 2025. How did it feel winning this award, especially when this is your first gig in the industry? 

Haynes: It was amazing. Just to be shortlisted was amazing, I didn't expect to win. It was such a great way to round off the year I've had here as well as a great recognition of the  hard work I put in and of how much I'd grown over my time at Disney. It’s also a recognition of the amazing creative team at Disney Plus who supported and encouraged me so much during my internship.

‍Spotlight: You have one more year of university. What are you thinking next? 

‍Haynes:  My horizons have been expanded from this year at Disney. I think so many different roles exist that I previously didn't know about. It makes it more overwhelming but also much more exciting. I would definitely like to try lots of things, but I think I’d really love to become a digital producer. 

‍Spotlight: Last question – what’s the coolest creative thing you’ve seen in the world lately?

‍Haynes: The most creative thing I’ve seen recently is the new Canva out-of-home (OOH) campaign that’s circulating at the moment. It visually captures the power of their tools, playing with scale and aspect ratio to create eye-catching billboards. It’s such a perfect mix of fun and creativity whilst making its main target audience feel seen.