The Little Mermaid trailer gives first look at Melissa McCarthy’s Ursula – and the verdict is in
Melissa McCarthy as Ursula (L) and Halle Bailey as Ariel (R) in The Little Mermaid. (Disney/YouTube)
The first Little Mermaid trailer dropped during the Oscars 2023, giving a closer look at Halle Bailey as Ariel and Melissa McCarthy as Ursula.
McCarthy and Bailey introduced the trailer during Sunday night’s (12 March) ceremony.
“For 100 years the Walt Disney company has produced some of the best heroes, villains and stories of all time and this amazing legacy would not be complete without The Little Mermaid,” McCarthy told the audience. She added that 1,735 film artists technicians and crafts people had come together to tell the story.
“I may be biased,” she said, “but I have enjoyed making this film. It has been a complete joy.”
The new trailer teases the interaction between Ariel and Ursula as the mermaid seeks to be with her human love, Prince Eric (Jonah Hauer-King) against the wishes of father, King Triton, played by Javier Bardem.
We first hear Ursula tell Ariel: “Poor child. I can help you. You can’t live in that world unless you become a human yourself.”
Then we finally get our first look at McCarthy behind the scaly tentacles. When Ariel asks if it is even possible to be human, the camera pans to her dramatically proclaiming: “It’s what I live for.”
We then see Ursula grab Ariel by her tentacles and concoct her magic, raising fumes into the air. It is all very camp.
As one fan put it on Twitter: “Only 17 seconds of Melissa McCarthy as Ursula in this trailer and she’s already mother status like she’s gonna eat on poor unfortunate souls sooo bad. I’m not ready!!!”
Another added: “The voice? The laugh? Oh, Miss Melissa ate this role up! So excited for this movie.”
One fan even said that Pat Carroll, who famously voiced Ursula in the 1989 animated version, “would have been proud”.
The Little Mermaid trailer gives us a longer snippet of Halle Bailey’s big musical moment – “Part Of Your World” – after it was debuted in the first teaser trailer.
Of course, we still have McCarthy’s major solo to look forward to, “Poor Unfortunate Souls”, which she has already spoken about.
Appearing on The Kelly Clarkson Show, McCarthy admitted to being “scared to death” recording the track.
“When we finally recorded it and they were like: ‘That’s it, you’ve got your song.’ I burst out crying,'” she said.
The Little Mermaid is due to open in the UK on 26 May.
