Halle Bailey plays a mermaid who hopelessly falls for Johan Hauer-King’s shipwrecked prince in The Little Mermaid trailer, dropped during the 95th Academy Awards ceremony on March 13.
Along with Melissa McCarthy, who looked resplendent in a red gown, Bailey presented the trailer of this live-action retelling of the 1989 animated Disney classic on the Oscars stage.
The first black woman to play the role of Ariel, Bailey was decked up in a light blue gown for the occasion.
In the trailer, we see a mermaid called Ariel (Halle Bailey) saving Prince Eric when the latter’s ship is destroyed during a storm. The mermaid hopelessly falls for Eric (Johan Hauer-King) and asks help from evil sea-witch Ursula (Melissa McCarthy).
Bailey looks magical in the trailer with red locks and a shimmery mermaid tail. She is accompanied by Sebastian the crab and Flounder, voiced by Tony Award winner Daveed Diggs and Jacob Tremblay respectively. With her tentacles and her white hair up in a pouffe, McCarthy’s sea-witch appears to be scarily accurate to the original Disney version of Ursula.
Oscar-recipient Javier Bardem plays the role of Ariel’s father, King Triton, who forbids his daughter from interacting with the human world only for her to do exactly that.
Not much is given away in the two-minute-20-second trailer that also features a heartfelt rendition of Part of Your World. The movie’s soundtrack, created by Lin-Manuel Miranda and Alan Menken, will also feature classics from the original movie in addition to four original songs.
Produced by Marc Platt, Miranda and Rob Marshall, The Little Mermaid is set for a theatrical release in May this year.
