The director has claimed that it was because Halle “embodied the role” the best, and while the girl can sing, there’s no evidence to support that the claim is true. Instead, there is overwhelming evidence to support that he isn’t being completely honest and that there are more sinister reasons behind the decision.
- My theory: it’s because they rejected the pitch to do a Live Action Princess and the Frog (because they want to do a television series instead called Tiana). This leaves them without a major Live Action black princess in a remake movie. Unless they race swap one of the three left: Ariel, Snow White, or Pocahontas. And think about it: which of these three will get you less backlash in today’s social climate to race swap into a black character? It’s a no brainer of a corner they backed themselves into.
- But they’ve also just decided to go all out anti-white. Here’s how I back this up:
☝️For starters: it’s absurd to think Halle Bailey is truly the ONLY person in the WORLD who could play the role. Especially when we see that the Universal Live Action Mermaid’s director auditioned over 250 girls and came away with 4 good options to play the role who would’ve looked like the character from the original story: rosy complexion, eyes as blue as the deepest seas, and white skin, and also possessing a beautiful singing voice. (Some of these options were: Maya Hawk, Elle Fanning, and Chloe Grace Moretz). The entire cast of Celtic Woman proves that there are women with amazing singing voices in the world who could sing the part as well as look the part.
☝️Some recent recasting:
the Blue Fairy (Pinnochio): was blond. Now is black.
Ariel (the Little Mermaid): was red head. Now is black.
Tinker Bell (Peter Pan): was blond. Now is black.
Peter Pan: was a red head, now is Hindustani
Snow White: was a brunette. Now is latina.
Other theories are: this is a way for Disney to create a controversy which will help publicize the movie (bad press is still press). Which seems plausible. Look at all the free press this casting decision has generated!
Another Theory: Disney is aware that their Live Action Little Mermaid movie has other major defects, for example, that the story isn’t that good, (since they’ve modified it from the original), that the CGI doesn’t look that great, and that the characters aren’t going to come across as believable, and instead of trying to make a better product, they want to use a black actress and blame racism for why it will fail. But I see no evidence to support that theory at the moment, besides that the trailer does seem rather dull-toned.
Another emerging theory: When some actresses saw the script changes to Ariel’s character, for example, how she is a feminist now and “doesn’t need a man,” some actresses may have backed out on the grounds of principle, and felt that portraying the character in that way would be suicide for their career. And Halle wasn’t as squeamish about changing the original character. (This theory seems extremely plausible! But there’s no way to prove it until we see how radically different the character is. The trailer doesn’t show the whole story).
As to why Disney doesn’t seem to care about inventing and casting an original character who could be a black princess (or a tribal leader of some kind who is from Africa or even Australia, since we call Pocahontas a “Princess” as that is her role in her tribe but it’s technically not a monarchy), we can only guess. It’s hard to believe the entire continent of Africa could be devoid of a character suitable to use for inspiration. I suppose it’s gotten to the point though that the whole diversity agenda and cancel culture have made it rather impossible to come up with good stories since it creates so many restrictions on creativity, but I think we’d all have more respect for Disney if they braved the social climate and took the risk on something new instead of soullessly race swapping existing characters like it doesn’t matter in an attempt to fix their major mistakes with casting and project selection.