108 Fun Facts About The Little Mermaid

In The Little Mermaid, who is Ariel's best friend, a nervous yellow-and-blue fish?

Flounder, Ariel's timid best friend, was voiced by Jason Marin in the 1989 film; despite the name he is drawn as a yellow-and-blue tropical fish, not a flatfish.

What are the names of Ursula's two green moray eel henchmen?

Flotsam and Jetsam spy on Ariel for Ursula, who kills them by accident with a blast meant for Eric; her fury at losing them is what makes her swell to giant size.

What breed of dog is Max, Prince Eric's loyal pet in the animated film?

Old English Sheepdog Max sniffs out Ariel before any human does: he tracks her scent and licks her face, the first to know she is the girl who saved Eric.

Who plays Ariel in Disney's 2023 live-action remake?

Halle Bailey was the first to audition, after the director saw her sing at the 2019 Grammys in the sister duo Chloe x Halle; he said nobody who followed surpassed her.

Which comedy star plays the sea witch Ursula in the 2023 live-action remake?

Melissa McCarthy's Ursula comes with a new backstory: the remake makes the sea witch King Triton's estranged sister, so the villain is now Ariel's aunt.

In Disney's The Little Mermaid, sixteen-year-old Ariel is which of King Triton's seven daughters?

The youngest of seven, Ariel still snaps at her father that she is 'sixteen years old' and no child; Andersen's mermaid was the youngest too, with five older sisters.

Hans Christian Andersen, author of the original fairy tale, was from which country?

Denmark's Andersen borrowed from the German novella 'Undine' but changed its ending, writing that a mermaid's soul should not hang on whether a human happens to love her.

In the direct-to-video sequel Return to the Sea, what is the name of Ariel and Eric's child?

Melody is her mother's story in reverse: raised on land behind a wall built to keep her from the sea, she longs for the ocean that Ariel was so desperate to leave.

The famous bronze Little Mermaid statue sits on the Langelinie promenade in which city?

Copenhagen keeps having to repair her: the mermaid has been doused in paint again and again, and in 2003 vandals blasted her off her rock into the harbour.

What name does Ursula use when she disguises herself as a human to seduce Prince Eric?

Vanessa hypnotises Eric with Ariel's stolen voice, worn in a nautilus shell at her throat; fittingly, Ariel's own voice actress, Jodi Benson, spoke the impostor's lines.

What is the title of Ursula's big villain song in the animated film?

'Poor Unfortunate Souls' cost Elaine Stritch the part of Ursula: she reworked its tempo against the lyricist's wishes and was dropped, and the sea witch went to Pat Carroll instead.

Which duo wrote and directed Disney's animated The Little Mermaid?

Ron Clements and John Musker's film began with a bookshop browse: Clements came across Andersen's tale on a shelf and pitched it to the studio in a two-page treatment.

Who wrote the lyrics for Disney's 1989 The Little Mermaid, working with composer Alan Menken?

Howard Ashman wrote the lyrics with composer Alan Menken, co-produced the film, and pushed for the songs to drive the story as they would in a Broadway show.

Before its lyricist made him Jamaican, The Little Mermaid's Sebastian was first written as a crab of which nationality?

British was the first idea, a stuffy crab named Clarence; the lyricist proposed a Jamaican instead, and the change pulled the film's music toward calypso.

Ursula's look was famously modelled on which real-life figure?

Drag queen Divine, star of John Waters' Pink Flamingos, never saw the villain he inspired: he died in March 1988, twenty months before the film opened.

Animators studied footage of which person to work out how Ariel's hair should move underwater?

The team studied Astronaut Sally Ride in space, since weightless hair in orbit closely matched hair drifting in water; they also filmed a live-action model in a pool.

The Little Mermaid's Broadway director, Francesca Zambello, had made her name in which field?

Opera was Francesca Zambello's trade; on Broadway she conjured the sea with no real water, only translucent sets that light could turn from the ocean depths to the sun above.

In the sequel Return to the Sea, how is the villain Morgana related to Ursula?

She is her sister, out to avenge Ursula's death; fittingly, Pat Carroll, who had voiced Ursula, came back to voice Morgana too.

Jodi Benson, the voice of Ariel, appears on screen as a secretary in which Disney film?

Enchanted put the voice of a cartoon princess into real life: Benson plays Sam, a lawyer's secretary in the Manhattan office its animated heroine stumbles into.

In the prequel Ariel's Beginning, what does a grieving King Triton ban from Atlantica after losing Queen Athena?

Singing and playing songs were banned after Triton lost Queen Athena to a pirate ship; Ariel breaks the ban when a new fish friend leads her to the secret Catfish Club, where Sebastian performs.

Disney's 1990s Little Mermaid TV series is set at which point in Ariel's story?

Before the film's events: the CBS Saturday-morning series is a prequel with Ariel still a mermaid, yet Pat Carroll's Ursula is there to trouble her all the same.

A ballerina refused to pose nude, so whose body did the Little Mermaid's sculptor use?

His wife's: Eline posed for sculptor Edvard Eriksen after Ellen Price, the dancer whose performance as the mermaid had prompted the statue, would not model unclothed.

The man who commissioned the Little Mermaid statue was the son of which company's founder?

Carlsberg's Carl Jacobsen ordered the statue after a ballet of the tale captivated him in 1909; his own art collection became a museum, the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek.

In Andersen's original tale, which relative tells the little mermaid that humans have an immortal soul?

Her grandmother explains that mermaids live three hundred years but have no soul that outlasts them; wanting one, not just the prince, is what sends the heroine to the sea witch.

In Andersen's tale, what happens to a mermaid when she dies?

She turns into sea foam: in Andersen's tale mermaids live 300 years but have no immortal soul, and that soul is what the heroine truly wants.

Who directed the 2023 live-action remake of The Little Mermaid?

Rob Marshall, the director of Chicago and Mary Poppins Returns, said his Ariel's audition moved him to tears, and that no later hopeful matched it.

Alan Menken wrote the new songs for the 2023 Little Mermaid remake with which lyricist?

Lin-Manuel Miranda, raised on the original, said he loved Sebastian's songs too much to write the crab new ones; his additions include 'Wild Uncharted Waters' for Eric.

Jodi Benson, the original animated voice of Ariel, has a cameo in the 2023 remake as what?

Benson appears as A market vendor who hands Ariel a fork during the tour of Eric's kingdom, a wink to Scuttle's most famously mislabelled piece of 'human stuff'.

Besides Ariel, Jodi Benson is best known for voicing which character in the Toy Story films?

Barbie, Benson's role in Toy Story 2 and 3, falls for Ken in the third film; her decades of Disney voice work made Benson a Disney Legend in 2011.

Which song from Disney's 1989 The Little Mermaid won the Academy Award for Best Original Song?

'Under the Sea' is Sebastian's calypso-flavoured plea for Ariel to stay at home and forget the surface, sung in the film by Samuel E. Wright.

Who played Ursula in ABC's 2019 special The Little Mermaid Live!?

Queen Latifah's turn came in a special ABC had shelved once: planned for 2017, it was put on hold and revived for the film's 30th anniversary, when about nine million watched.

Ursula's six tentacles are said to make her less octopus than which animal?

Squid, some say: the animators trimmed Ursula from eight tentacles to six, though others argue that her two arms make up the full set.

Jeffrey Katzenberg wanted to cut which Little Mermaid song after children grew restless at a test screening?

'Part of Your World' stayed because its makers dug in: the lyricist refused to lose it, and the team won it a second, more finished test screening, where a new audience of children took to it.

Which future comedy star read for the voice of Prince Eric in Disney's The Little Mermaid?

Jim Carrey read for Eric early in his career, one of the film's directors recalled, while Bill Maher and Michael Richards both tried out for Scuttle the seagull.

Katzenberg passed on The Little Mermaid in the mid-1980s because Disney was developing a sequel to which film?

Splash, the 1984 Tom Hanks and Daryl Hannah hit from Disney's Touchstone label, was getting a sequel, Splash, Too, which ended up as a 1988 TV movie rather than a cinema release.

In Disney's The Little Mermaid, what is Sebastian's official post at King Triton's court?

Court composer Horatio Thelonious Ignacious Crustaceous Sebastian has a name to fit the post, but spends the film as the king's unwilling spy on Ariel.

Ariel's look was partly modelled on which then-teenage TV actress?

Alyssa Milano, the teenage star of Who's the Boss?, lent Ariel part of her look, but not her moves: for those the animators filmed a comedian acting out the mermaid's scenes.

How did the Broadway production of The Little Mermaid make its performers appear to swim across the stage?

Wheeled Heelys sneakers struck choreographer Stephen Mear at a theme park, when a child rolled past him; he wanted swimmers who could glide and still dance, which wires would not allow.

Which part of the Little Mermaid statue was sawn off in 1964 and never found?

Her head vanished one night in April 1964 and a new one had to be cast; decades later the artist Jørgen Nash claimed the deed, which the police had never solved.

The Little Mermaid statue first left home in 2010 for a World Expo in which city?

Shanghai borrowed the statue for its six-month Expo; back at her empty rock, the artist Ai Weiwei set up a giant video screen showing her in her new home.

In Andersen's original tale, what does the sea witch take from the mermaid as payment for the potion?

Her tongue is the price: the witch cuts it out to take the mermaid's voice, so on land she can never tell the prince that she was the one who pulled him from the wreck.

In Andersen's tale, the mermaid spares the prince and is transformed into what?

A daughter of the air can earn a soul by three hundred years of good deeds, and Andersen adds a twist for his readers: each well-behaved child she finds takes a year off.

Which reggae star played Sebastian in the 2019 ABC special The Little Mermaid Live!?

Shaggy sang the crab's numbers live on the Disney lot while the 1989 film itself played on a giant screen, cutting to the stage for each song.

In Disney's The Little Mermaid, what does Prince Eric use to kill the giant Ursula?

A ship's bowsprit: Ursula's own storm drags sunken wrecks up from the seabed, and Eric takes the wheel of one and drives its splintered prow straight through her.

Which Disney film ends with a dedication to the lyricist 'who gave a mermaid her voice' and its hero 'his soul'?

Beauty and the Beast carries that dedication to its lyricist, who died of complications from AIDS in March 1991 at the age of 40, months before the film opened.

Kay Nielsen died in 1957, yet has a credit on 1989's The Little Mermaid for what?

Story sketches: Walt Disney's own Andersen film was shelved, but Nielsen's pastels for it stayed in the studio archive, where the 1980s crew studied them and gave him a credit.

Besides the Oscar for its best song, which other Academy Award did Disney's 1989 The Little Mermaid win?

Best Original Score went to Alan Menken, so both of the film's Oscars rewarded the studio's gamble of building a cartoon like a Broadway musical.

The Little Mermaid is said to have needed more effects animation than any Disney feature since which film?

Fantasia had been the benchmark since 1940; a tale set under water meant scene after scene of bubbles, ripples, distortions and surface reflections.

In Smile, a 1986 musical co-written by The Little Mermaid's lyricist, Jodi Benson introduced a ballad named after which place?

'Disneyland' was her big number in Smile; when the show closed within weeks, its lyricist invited her to audition for Ariel.

In Andersen's tale, every step on her new legs feels to the little mermaid like treading on what?

Sharp knives, the witch warns her, yet she dances for the prince anyway, and so lightly that no one at the palace has ever danced so well.

According to Scuttle the seagull, what is the proper name for a fork?

A dinglehopper is Scuttle's word for a fork, given as confidently as he calls a smoking pipe a 'snarfblatt'; Ariel treats him as her expert on humans, and he is wrong every time.

The Little Mermaid was Disney's first animated fairy tale since which film?

Sleeping Beauty (1959) was the studio's previous fairy-tale feature; The Little Mermaid's 1989 success launched the run of hits known as the Disney Renaissance.

Ariel was almost given hair of what colour before the filmmakers settled on red?

Blonde was the early idea, and the filmmakers looked to supermodel Christie Brinkley for inspiration before giving Ariel the red hair she is now known for.

The Little Mermaid's original script was written with which Golden Girls star in mind for Ursula?

Bea Arthur never voiced the part: one of the directors recalled that the script asked for a 'Bea Arthur voice', her agent took offence, and the actress was never shown it.

Animators filmed comedian Sherri Stoner acting out Ariel's scenes; which habit of hers ended up in the character?

Biting her lip is 'pure Sherri', animator Glen Keane said; Stoner mimed the film's scenes on video, among foam rocks and hand puppets, for the artists to draw from.

Disney's The Little Mermaid was the studio's last animated feature to use which process, in use since 101 Dalmatians?

Xerography, which photocopied animators' pencil lines directly onto cels, had been used since 101 Dalmatians in 1961; from 1990 Disney switched to the digital CAPS ink-and-paint system.

The Little Mermaid returned to cinemas in November 1997, the same month as which rival animated film?

Anastasia's studio chiefs at Fox accused Disney of timing the reissue to smother their film; Disney called the timing routine, and the mermaid took another $27.2 million.

Who played Ursula in the Hollywood Bowl's 2019 live-to-film concert of The Little Mermaid?

Harvey Fierstein, a Tony winner as Edna Turnblad in Hairspray, took over a part that Rebel Wilson had sung at the Bowl's first Little Mermaid concerts three years earlier.

Disney's paint lab mixed a special shade, later named Ariel, for which part of the Little Mermaid?

Her tail got a custom sea-green hue that the studio's paint lab mixed specially and then named Ariel after her.

Effects animators on The Little Mermaid drew over a million of what, by their supervisor's estimate?

Bubbles by the million had to be drawn for the underwater scenes, and Disney farmed much of that work out to a studio in Beijing.

Which pop star turned down Prince Eric in Disney's 2023 Little Mermaid remake to go on tour?

Harry Styles was in early talks to play Eric but chose a concert tour instead, and the part went to Jonah Hauer-King after hundreds of actors auditioned.

In Disney's The Little Mermaid, Ursula keeps Ariel's stolen voice inside what, worn around her neck?

A nautilus shell holds the voice until it is smashed at the wedding, which gives Ariel her voice back and snaps Prince Eric out of his trance.

Sebastian from The Little Mermaid leaps out of a recipe book for a cameo in which later Disney film?

Aladdin's Genie is hunting through royal recipes when the crab pops out of a page on Alaskan king crab and pinches his finger.

Jodi Benson voiced Ariel again when the Disney princesses shared a scene in which animated sequel?

Ralph Breaks the Internet brought back most of the princesses' original voice actresses and dressed Ariel and her friends in comfy modern clothes.

Disney's Little Mermaid ride, Ariel's Undersea Adventure, seats guests in vehicles shaped like what?

Clamshells carry riders backwards down a beach and 'underwater', an illusion made with projections and blasts of cold air.

Which Oscar-winning actor plays King Triton in Disney's 2023 live-action The Little Mermaid?

Javier Bardem plays the sea king, and said he made him a little less grumpy than the cartoon so that a father's fear shows through the anger.

Which song does Sebastian strike up while Ariel and Prince Eric drift across a lagoon in a rowing boat?

Kiss the Girl earned an Oscar nomination for Best Original Song, only to lose to another number from the very same film.

What kind of sea creature chases Ariel through a sunken ship early in The Little Mermaid?

A shark named Glut chases her and Flounder through the wreck until he gets his head stuck in an anchor, and he is not seen again in the film.

When King Triton takes Ariel's place in Ursula's bargain in The Little Mermaid, what does he become?

A polyp is what every victim in Ursula's garden becomes, and they all change back into merpeople the moment she is defeated.

In The Little Mermaid, Scuttle confidently tells Ariel that which human object is a snarfblatt?

A smoking pipe is Scuttle's snarfblatt, one more bluff from a gull who poses as an expert on human things yet gets their names wrong.

In The Little Mermaid, what kind of sea creature serves King Triton as his herald and messenger?

A seahorse serves King Triton as herald, master of ceremonies and messenger, and opens the film's undersea concert by announcing the king's arrival.

What is being celebrated on Prince Eric's ship the night Ariel first sees him in The Little Mermaid?

His birthday party ends in a storm, and Eric nearly drowns going back for his dog before Ariel pulls him to shore.

The Little Mermaid began which era of Disney animation, spanning ten films to 1999?

The Renaissance is the name given to Disney's 1989 to 1999 run, a decade of ten animated features that closed with Tarzan.

Which Emmy-winning comedian voiced the sea witch Ursula in Disney's 1989 The Little Mermaid?

Pat Carroll called the sea witch one of her favourite parts, and went on voicing her in series, games and theme parks for more than thirty years.

Which rapper and actress voices Scuttle in Disney's 2023 live-action The Little Mermaid?

Awkwafina performs The Scuttlebutt, a rap number written specially for the remake.

Which Hamilton star voices Sebastian the crab in Disney's 2023 live-action The Little Mermaid?

Daveed Diggs has said the role took a large amount of work, both in preparing for it and in recording the crab's dialogue.

Samuel E. Wright, The Little Mermaid's Sebastian, originated which role in Broadway's The Lion King?

Mufasa brought him a second Tony nomination in 1998, fourteen years after his first for The Tap Dance Kid.

Which veteran comedian voiced Scuttle in The Little Mermaid and made its 2000 sequel his final film?

Buddy Hackett, already famous from The Music Man and The Love Bug, returned as the muddled gull one last time three years before his death.

Which Star Trek: Deep Space Nine regular voiced the crab-chasing Chef Louis in The Little Mermaid?

René Auberjonois, who played Odo on that series, sang Les Poissons as the unhinged palace cook years after playing Father Mulcahy in the film M*A*S*H.

Disney's 2023 The Little Mermaid spent a summer filming on location on which Mediterranean island?

Sardinia hosted the remake's location shoot in summer 2021, and its star later shared photos of herself swimming in the sea there.

Disney's 2023 The Little Mermaid was mostly shot at which English studio, home of James Bond?

Pinewood Studios was due to host the shoot in spring 2020, but the pandemic delayed it and cameras only rolled in January 2021.

In 2022 The Little Mermaid was picked for preservation on which US list of significant films?

National Film Registry titles are chosen by the Library of Congress for being culturally, historically or aesthetically significant; the film joined 33 years after its release.

The Little Mermaid won Disney's first Best Original Song Oscar since which musical 25 years earlier?

Mary Poppins won for the chimney sweep's song Chim Chim Cher-ee, and no Disney film took the prize again for a quarter of a century.

Which Disney park has a whole land, Mermaid Lagoon, built to look like King Triton's palace?

Tokyo DisneySea built Mermaid Lagoon mostly indoors, so that walking through it feels like being underwater.

Ariel fights alongside the hero as a party member in the Atlantica world of which video game series?

Kingdom Hearts makes Atlantica a playable underwater world, with Ursula as its boss and one of Maleficent's inner circle of villains.

Jodi Benson, the voice of Ariel, also voiced which other Andersen title character in a 1994 film?

Thumbelina, Don Bluth's 1994 feature, gave Benson a second Andersen heroine five years after she first played the mermaid.

Which two-time Oscar winner voices villain Marina Del Rey in The Little Mermaid: Ariel's Beginning?

Sally Field plays a governess who schemes to take Sebastian's job, and gets a villain number of her own, Just One Mistake.

In The Little Mermaid: Ariel's Beginning, the villain's gentle sidekick Benjamin is which animal?

A manatee, mild-mannered Benjamin is fond of Ariel and her sisters and keeps wishing his scheming boss would be nicer to them.

In The Little Mermaid: Ariel's Beginning, Sebastian fronts the house band at which nightspot?

The Catfish Club has the crab on vocals and maracas, backed by a manta ray on bass, a blowfish on sax, an octopus on piano and a turtle on drums.

In The Little Mermaid II, King Triton shrinks Morgana's hulking henchman Undertow into which fish?

A piranha is all that remains of the hulking Undertow, though he keeps his stripes and big dorsal fin until Morgana gets the trident and restores him.

Which actor voiced the Evil Manta and sang his song Just Like Me in the Little Mermaid TV series?

Tim Curry's villain is freed from an undersea volcano by a well-meaning Ariel and spends the series scheming to seize Atlantica.

Which Star Wars actor voiced Hans Christian Andersen in an episode of the Little Mermaid TV series?

Mark Hamill's Andersen explores the seabed in a primitive submarine, meets Ariel and goes home inspired to write his famous tale.

Which Full House star played Chef Louis at the Hollywood Bowl and in ABC's The Little Mermaid Live!?

John Stamos first played the crab-hunting cook at the Hollywood Bowl in 2016, then repeated the part on live television three years later.

Which actress, the voice of a 2016 Disney heroine, played Ariel in ABC's The Little Mermaid Live!?

Auliʻi Cravalho, the voice of Moana, sang Ariel in a 2019 special staged for the film's 30th anniversary and to promote the launch of Disney+.

Which Oscar-winning actress voiced Ursula, glimpsed as a tentacle, in Disney's Descendants 2?

Whoopi Goldberg is heard shouting from the kitchen of Ursula's fish and chip restaurant, while the sea witch's daughter Uma is the film's real villain.

Which Disney sequel, released right after The Little Mermaid, swapped painted cels for digital colour?

The Rescuers Down Under was coloured on computers with a system Pixar helped Disney develop, which ended the era of hand-painted cels.

An early inspiration for Ursula in The Little Mermaid was which star of the 1980s soap Dynasty?

Joan Collins's scheming Alexis Carrington was suggested as a starting point by the film's lyricist, a devoted fan of the show.

Which Broadway veteran was cast as Ursula in The Little Mermaid, then dropped after a clash over songs?

Elaine Stritch won the part with what one director called an eccentric, loopy reading, but would not sing the witch's big number at the tempo its lyricist wanted.

To keep a song in The Little Mermaid, its directors cited a number nearly cut from which classic musical?

The Wizard of Oz almost lost Over the Rainbow the same way, an argument that bought time until a second test audience warmed to the scene.

In The Little Mermaid, which loyal steward hopes Prince Eric will settle down with the right bride?

Grimsby has no stomach for the sea and scoffs at sailors' tales of merpeople; his voice actor, Ben Wright, died four months before the film opened.

In The Little Mermaid, where does Ariel hide her collection of treasures from the human world?

In a hidden grotto, until King Triton learns she loves a human and blasts the whole collection to pieces in a rage he quickly regrets.

Which song, written for the 2023 Little Mermaid remake, finally gives Prince Eric a solo of his own?

Wild Uncharted Waters was the first of the remake's new songs to be written, after its director asked for a number about the wildness of the open ocean.

Disney's 2023 The Little Mermaid sets Ariel's story on and around a fictional island in which sea?

The Caribbean Sea suits the remake's island realm, a new setting ruled by Queen Selina, a character invented for the film.

Disney's first Little Mermaid TV plan was a puppet show with creatures by which puppeteer's workshop?

Jim Henson's company was to supply puppets playing opposite a live Ariel, but the plan was dropped after his death and Disney made a cartoon series instead.

The Little Mermaid was first pitched to Disney chiefs at an ideas meeting named after which TV talent contest?

The Gong Show lent its name to sessions where staff pitched ideas in turn; the two-page mermaid treatment was turned down there, then approved the next day.

Which Japanese studio, also behind the NES DuckTales game, developed the 1991 Little Mermaid game?

Capcom's side-scroller picks up after the film: Ursula has seized the ocean, so Ariel turns mermaid again to win it back.

Where did one of The Little Mermaid's directors chance upon Andersen's fairy tale, sparking the film?

In a bookstore, while he was still directing The Great Mouse Detective; he then pitched the idea to studio bosses in a two-page treatment.

Which singer-songwriter sang Ariel at the Hollywood Bowl's 2016 Little Mermaid concert, opposite Rebel Wilson?

Sara Bareilles sang the role for two nights, then stepped aside on the third so that Jodi Benson could play Ariel once more.