Zendaya Rumored To Have Been Offered Role As Ariel in Disney’s ‘The Little Mermaid’ Live Action Remake
Following the success of Spider-Man: Homecoming and The Greatest Showman, Zendaya has gone from a Disney Channel star to a professional actress and musician. However, it seems that she has not fully departed from Disney yet. According to Comic Book, she has been offered a starring role in Disney’s future live-action remake of The Little Mermaid.
Disney has been profiting intensely off live-actions in recent years, with both their Cinderella and Beauty and the Beast remakes receiving critical and commercial praise. Their Mulan remake has been a hot topic recently, especially regarding the casting and plot changes to the iconic Chinese film. If this rumor turns out to be true, their casting for this film will be met with equal amounts of attention — both good and bad.
This won’t be the first time Zendaya has taken a controversial role, however. Her casting as “MJ” in the most recent Spider-Man movie was the source of quite a bit of nerd-rage. Many said her taking a role as a white, redheaded woman was “inaccurate” and an “unnecessary push for diversity.” According to PopCrush, she refused to react negatively to the backlash.
“Of course there’s going to be outrage over that, because for some reason some people just aren’t ready,” she said in regard to her role in the Marvel film.
ZENDAYA Rumored to Be up for ARIEL Role in Live-Action ’THE LITTLE MERMAID' – https://t.co/UOyjrDI3Z1 pic.twitter.com/aOvnAqPe8L
— ComicBook NOW! (@ComicBookNOW) August 22, 2018
There is humor to be found in the fact that she’s taking another role as an iconic redhead, but many people are excited to see the star shine as a princess. Her fans are buzzing on Twitter and Tumblr, and several have already made edits of Zendaya as Ariel.
“If Zendaya actually gets the role of Ariel for the live action Little Mermaid, I’m never going to complain about anything ever again. I swear, please let this happen,” one user tweeted in all caps. The hype is real, but we can only hope the real thing lives up to their expectations.
However, things are looking good for the film so far. According to ThatHashtagShow, Alan Menken and Lin-Manuel Miranda will be composing the soundtrack for the movie. They will also be adding several new tracks, and if their previous work is any indication, these songs will be worth listening to. In fact, Miranda’s previous work on the Disney princess movie Moana earned nominations for several awards.
Currently, there is no set release date for the movie. Zendaya, her reps, and Disney’s representatives have not commented on the rumor yet, but there is high hopes that the casting will become a reality.
