Remaking The Little Mermaid in live-action was never going to be an easy task, but director Rob Marshall found one element particularly challenging: who would he pick to play Ursula, Ariel the mermaid's tentacled, voice-stealing adversary?
"It was really daunting to think about who was going to play this part," Marshall tells SFX magazine in the new issue, which features Star Trek: Picard on the cover. "I love that she was originally inspired by Divine [Harris Glenn Milstead], the wonderful drag actor, who was so original and so funny. I thought, 'Well, who’s going to be able to bring the humor and the depth?' Because this is now a live-action piece, it can’t just be a funny character, it has to have a great deal of depth. Who can do that and sing – really sing – and bring originality? I wanted a woman of size, too, as I thought that was important."
