The Little Mermaid’s Ursula’s Horrible Makeup, Finally Explained
Disney’s live-action remake has had a bumpy ride with one controversy piling on top of another. Ursula’s casting and makeup are just the latest.
Melissa McCarthy’s Ursula has been met with backlash for a few reasons. First, fans are upset (but not surprised) over the fact that McCarthy scored the part. Ursula as a character was actually based on drag queen icon Divine, and the resemblance was once uncanny. 1989’s Ursula might as well be Divine’s identical twin, and the only way we would be able to tell the difference is by the fact that Ursula is animated.
People had hoped that Disney would want to pay homage to the drag culture and cast a drag queen in this role, but the company ultimately decided to go in a different direction for a kids’ movie. We love Melissa, but she ain’t it for The Little Mermaid’s Ursula.
Then McCarthy’s Ursula transformation was revealed ahead of the premiere, and the character’s makeup came under fire. You can’t even blame the people who are mad – the makeup does look like it was done by a five-year-old. The eyebrows aren’t twins (they aren’t even sisters), the eyeshadow is giving a 2000s vibe (and not in a good way), and the whole look is just a far cry from 1989’s version.
Can’t Disney afford qualified makeup artists anymore? Not quite. In an interview for Allure, the artist behind the makeup, Peter Swords King, explained that Ursula’s uneven eyebrows (and the rest) were intentional.
He shared that they wanted McCarthy to still be recognizable and not “look like a drag queen,” although the inspiration for the character came from that world. The idea was that Ursula supposedly did her makeup all by herself, which is why it looked “bad.”
While the artist admitted to using drag queens’ makeup techniques such as blending and contouring, he still wanted to deviate from a drag queen look for Melissa’s character. In any case, the fans aren’t big on the changes and are disappointed that a queer artist wasn’t hired instead.
King shared with Insider that he found the backlash “offensive” because he could do the job just as well as a queer artist would’ve. That’s not really the point that the fans are trying to make, though…
The Little Mermaid has almost doubled its budget, but it is far from being a box office success. Let’s see what the future holds for this Disney remake.