Little Mermaid trailer takes social media by storm for casting Black Ariel. Halle Bailey reacts
India Today
The first trailer for the brand new The Little Mermaid has received a great response from fans for casting a Black Ariel. Lead actress Halle Bailey has now reacted to it.
A live-action remake of Disney's 1989 movie The Little Mermaid is all set to release on May 26, 2023. Rob Marshall will be directing and actress and singer Halle Bailey will be starring as Ariel. The film's trailer has got fans really excited! Jonah Hauer-King will be playing Prince Eric and Melissa McCarthy will be starring as the evil sea witch Ursula. Lots of fans are applauding Walt Disney Pictures and director Marshall for casting a black woman as Ariel.
In the original film, 16-year-old Ariel was fascinated by humans and desperately wanted to experience their world. The upcoming film will include music from the original movie, plus new tracks developed by EGOT winner Alan Menken and Hamilton creator Lin-Manuel Miranda. The first teaser trailer for the film was released at Disney's D23 Expo in Anaheim, California.
Following the teaser trailer for the live-action version of Disney's The Little Mermaid, parents of young Black girls are posting videos across social media of their children's reactions to seeing Halle Bailey as Ariel. "I wanna watch it!" a girl says in a video posted by TikTok user Adelia Chaiyakul. "Mommy! ... She's brown like me!" said a girl in another TikTok. Many similar videos have been shared across social media since the teaser trailer was released on Friday, with hashtags such as #representationmatters and #Blackgirlmagic. The trailer has surpassed 12 million views.
Watch the trailer here:
Halle Bailey has now said that she is in awe of the reaction to the film’s trailer. The actress was responding to a Brazilian tweet captioned, “Compilation of the reaction of black children seeing Halle Bailey as Ariel in The Little Mermaid”. Bailey posted a message in response saying, “People have been sending these reactions to me all weekend and i’m in truly in awe this means the world to me (sic).”
Meanwhile, Marshall told Deadline he was proud of the diverse cast assembled and said that there was no agenda in casting Bailey. "We saw everybody, but it was hers," he said. "It had nothing to do with anything exterior. It had everything to do with the interior — what she brings to it, the beauty, the passion, the fierceness, the vulnerability, the joy, the heart. Everything that she has was what we were looking for with Ariel."
Halle Bailey was cast in the role in 2019, triggering a backlash against her suitability for the part, which was largely characterised as racist.
