The Little Mermaid on Broadway

[Disney Duster]

It would be great if, just like they are reviving Beauty and the Beast, they would revive the show, for Broadway, and this time do it right. Better sets, costumes, and staging. Maybe even a better book. Maybe even use the old songs some of us heard, like "Wasting Away" for Ursula, the original version of "If Only", and the original version of "Poor Unfortunate Souls (Reprise)". Oooh, and "All Good Things Must End", especially if it's sung by Vanessa! That was like the best new song!

And if they can't do it "right", we all know they could at least do it better than they did it before.

[UmbrellaFish]

It would be nice, but I don’t think TLM will ever be revived on Broadway. Sometimes flops (and TLM was a flop as it couldn’t recoup its budget) get revived because producers and investors think it has some kind of artistic value, but I think Disney’s a lot more ruthless. They haven’t revived anything yet on Broadway, but when they do it will be one of their proven successes like BATB, or Poppins. Maybe even Newsies.

[Disney Duster]

Ohhhh...hmmmm...yeah, Disney might be like that. Shame if so.

But the reason I think they may still do it one day is because The Little Mermaid is probably their most popular property after The Lion King. They may think it could still be a success.

[supertalies]

It would be great if, just like they are reviving Beauty and the Beast, they would revive the show, for Broadway, and this time do it right. Better sets, costumes, and staging. Maybe even a better book. Maybe even use the old songs some of us heard, like "Wasting Away" for Ursula, the original version of "If Only", and the original version of "Poor Unfortunate Souls (Reprise)". Oooh, and "All Good Things Must End", especially if it's sung by Vanessa! That was like the best new song!

And if they can't do it "right", we all know they could at least do it better than they did it before.

They already completely revised The Little Mermaid though. The Dutch production, which I've seen, used all new costumes and a new set design by Bob Crowley (who did the set design for Mary Poppins the musical), including having the actors fly/swim. They also revised the book for this one by adding a whole new song and backstory for Urusla (in this version she was still Triton's older sister, but they had a bunch of older sisters that Urusula all murdered so she could have the throne. Triton found out that Urusula had killed all their siblings and thus banished her, taking the throne for himself). I believe they also made some other changes.

This new revised is now the new officially licensed version of the musical and the one used as the basis for all future productions. So if they do eventually bring the show back to Broadway, it's most certainly gonna be based on this version of the show.

[Sotiris]

The show may be coming to the UK.

Rumour: Disney's The Little Mermaid UK Premiere Planned
https://theatrefan.co.uk/rumour-disneys ... e-planned/

Alan Menken says Disney's Little Mermaid being 'reworked' for West End stage 17 years after Broadway debut
https://www.standard.co.uk/showbiz/alan ... 12205.html

[MrXemnas1992]

I feel like I'm one of the few who preferred the original broadway version. lol

[Sotiris]

The musical is coming to Paper Mill Playhouse.

Hillary Fisher, Haven Burton, Kyle Taylor Parker, Graham Rowat, More Cast in Paper Mill The Little Mermaid
https://playbill.com/article/hillary-fi ... le-mermaid

Hillary Fisher, Haven Burton, Kyle Taylor Parker, Graham Rowat Star in Paper Mill The Little Mermaid Beginning May 29
https://playbill.com/article/hillary-fi ... ing-may-29

[PatchofBlue]

The Papermill Playhouse production actually looks kinda nice. They've notably followed the remake's path by casting a Black Ariel, and I actually quite like her rendition of Part of Your World. I think she brings an appropriate balance of innocence without stepping over into saccharinity, which is what I find often happens with these stage show productions. I also heard a reel of her singing "If Only" somewhere, but lost track of it.

The production value also looks really neat. Lots of bright, luminescent colors and whatnot.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMM2kXJPT-0



Any more word from Alan or anyone if the show is being reworked after all? The show has a lot of great parts, and I'd love to see a version of the show where all the machinery is working. (Though, who's to say. It may just continue to deteriorate with another do-over.)

[Disney Duster]

If Only...the show had been done right on Broadway in it's original run. Flying instead of skating, tails instead of skirt/tail combos, and overall design that doesn't look like outer space, which unfortunately the Broadway and this latest Papermill production had.

[PatchofBlue]

I'm somewhat unique in my opinion in that I actually really liked the tails and skates of the Broadway run. I think the sight of their tails flowing behind them added an extra layer of elegance to their movements. Having the movements of their bodies echoed by the motions of their tails gave them a sort of kineticism that made the whole thing much more fun.

But I'll admit that it has to be done very carefully. A lot of productions have tried imitating it, but their go-to has just been to strap this brightly-colored construction beam to their waist and have them haul it around the whole show. There's none of the spontaneity and liberation of the spring method they used on Broadway. The first live-production I ever saw of the show was the 2011 Tuacahn rendition, and while I really liked a lot of their creative choices (e.g. showering the stage with a water curtain during the underwater scenes), the tails looked too rigid and stiff. I was worried that Ariel was going to swing around too fast and launch Flounder into the audience like a foul ball.

[Disney Duster]

I was worried that Ariel was going to swing around too fast and launch Flounder into the audience like a foul ball.

Haha! But, I am sorry, the flying is necessary for me! One review said the skirts and tails made the actors look like something other than merpeople. I don't remember what word they used...something like a genetic mutation or something funny. Since I can't take the skirts with tails and you are fine with the flying, gotta say it probably should be the flying. Bothers less people.

[PatchofBlue]

I was worried that Ariel was going to swing around too fast and launch Flounder into the audience like a foul ball.

Haha! But, I am sorry, the flying is necessary for me! One review said the skirts and tails made the actors look like something other than merpeople. I don't remember what word they used...something like a genetic mutation or something funny. Since I can't take the skirts with tails and you are fine with the flying, gotta say it probably should be the flying. Bothers less people.

I can imagine it might be expensive and/or cumbersome for more productions to pull that off all the time. I can appreciate when a company might put in the necessary time and effort to make it work, but I also think audiences have sufficient imagination to fill in the blanks on their own. It's similar to how I don't need the actors in The Lion King to walk on all fours to know that these guys are playing cats. (Or for that matter, it's similar to how I don't need the actors in Cats ...)

[Disney Duster]

I think the Lion King and Cats stuff are good artistic representations, but that the two-tailed merpeople on roller skates are not. And if you can't afford flying, don't put on Mermaid. If you can't afford proper looking costumes for Lion King, don't put that one on, either.

[PatchofBlue]

So what would you say the difference is for you?

I don't know if there have been any productions of Lion King without Julie Taymor's design, so I don't have a point of comparison.

[Thumper_93]

So what would you say the difference is for you?

I don't know if there have been any productions of Lion King without Julie Taymor's design, so I don't have a point of comparison.

I've never seen an alternative version of TLK. I think that it's a show so iconic and peculiar that Disney doesn't want to change anything. Here in Spain they had to make miracles to bring it because the theater is not big enough and they refused to make some changes because they wanted it to be as similar as possible.
Disney as many other companies uses to sell the rights of their musicals to another countries or companies. You can buy an exact replica of the broadway show or buy only the license and create a visually whole new show. Sometimes companies choose the second option because it uses to be more economic. I'm sure that the other adaptations of TLM are versions created by other companies with Disney behind. If I'm not wrong the European one was created by Stage Entertainment. This company makes non-replica musical but sometimes they have made their own version like they did wit BATB.

Sorry. I've found this program and yes, TLM in Europe was made by Stage Entertaiment. It seems that they bought the rights for the script and created everything from zero.

[Disney Duster]

So what would you say the difference is for you?

I don't know if there have been any productions of Lion King without Julie Taymor's design, so I don't have a point of comparison.

I would say the two-tail thing makes me think "Why do they have two tails? Merpeople are half human, why not just use the human parts with single tails instead of it looking like Ariel already has legs, and roller skating legs to be exact ", while The Lion King costumes make me think, "Oh, that's an artistic representation, not trying to be literal, and they are using African influence because the story is set in Africa, that makes sense", and for Cats, I think, "Ok, you can't really make a human the same as a cat, but you can pretend their arms and legs are four cat legs and make their faces look like cats with the hair and make-up" and it doesn't look like the cats have extra appendages a cat or human wouldn't have.

So what about Sebastian and Flounder and Scuttle? I don't know how to search for it, but there was a Sebastian costume where he looked like an 18th century court advisor and it worked for me even with him being human-sized and having extra appendages, because a crab has more than four appendeges, it makes sense. I forget if I ever saw Flounder or Scuttle ever done well, but I can't search and find examples for those, either. And honestly I wouldn't mind the puppeteering route for the animals smaller than humans, either.

[PatchofBlue]

Hm ... I hadn't thought about it as them having two tails. To me, it was just the tail was the thing trailing behind them, and then they just had the fancy dressing over the actor's legs just out of necessity. But I can understand how once you see it, it's hard to look past.

I think puppets would be a really good route for the animal cast. I can't think of a production that's taken that approach, but I think you can have a lot of fun with those.

[Thumper_93]

Hm ... I hadn't thought about it as them having two tails. To me, it was just the tail was the thing trailing behind them, and then they just had the fancy dressing over the actor's legs just out of necessity. But I can understand how once you see it, it's hard to look past.

I think puppets would be a really good route for the animal cast. I can't think of a production that's taken that approach, but I think you can have a lot of fun with those.

I've always think that they "skirt" that they wear was like waves or something like that and the tail was only the one behind them. In my opinion the costumes didn't look bad.
The animals can be made with puppets. Timon in TLK is a puppet and Olaf in Frozen too. They both look great and you can also see the actor behind them so you can appreciate their work.

[Disney Duster]

I'm glad you see what I mean, PatchofBlue. I agree with you guys on the puppets.