Halle Bailey to Play Ariel in Disney’s Live-Action “The Little Mermaid”

Despite rumors for the last year and a half that Zendaya would be playing Ariel in Disney’s upcoming live-aciton adaptation of “The Little Mermaid”, it would appear that director Rob Marshall (“Mary Poppins Returns”) had a different pick in mind.

According to Variety, Chloe x Halle’s Halle Bailey will be bringing the aquatic princess to life on the big screen.

“After an extensive search, it was abundantly clear that Halle possesses that rare combination of spirit, heart, youth, innocence, and substance — plus a glorious singing voice — all intrinsic qualities necessary to play this iconic role,” Marshall said in a statement. Other sources indicate that Bailey was a frontrunner for the role “from the beginning” of the search.

 Jacob Tremblay was recently mentioned to be playing Ariel’s best friend Flounder, and Awkwafina as the seagull, Scuttle. Melissa McCarthy is apparently “in talks” to play the sea witch, Ursula.

There are a few things we know for sure, namely that original animated “Little Mermaid” score composer Alan Menken is on board, as well as Lin-Manuel Miranda. Just last month, Tim Burk (“Fantastic Beasts“) was added as visual effects supervisor, according to HNEntertainment.

Menken recently tweeted a photo of he and Lin-Manuel, with the caption “And we’re off and swimming!”, to which Miranda responded with a dark-skinned mermaid emoji.

We will of course let you know what we hear about “The Little Mermaid“.