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Chloë Grace Moretz, the upcoming star of the new Little Mermaid movie, recently revealed to ET that she’s staying blonde for the role.
Because so many of us grew up with Ariel’s iconic red hair.
As it turns out, Hans Christian Andersen never specified a hair color for the little mermaid in his original tale.
She’s described as having “skin … as clear and delicate as a rose-leaf, and … eyes as blue as the deepest sea; but, like [her sisters], she had no feet, and her body ended in a fish’s tail.”
Her hair is described as “long,” “thick,” and “waving” at different points, but we’re never given a color.
Hair does play a huge role in the original story though.
The little mermaid’s sisters cut theirs off to try and bargain with the sea witch to save her life, and it’s pretty messed up. She sees “her sisters rising out of the flood: they were as pale as herself; but their long beautiful hair waved no more in the wind, and had been cut off.”
And in the original tale, the little mermaid’s grandmother is so distraught at the little mermaid leaving that “her white hair is falling off from sorrow.”
Prince Eric, however, will probably keep his Disney hair color. He’s described as having “large black eyes” and “raven hair.”
The character is also decidedly less charming in the original story.
Honestly, the original story is pretty terrifying.
Mermaids definitively have no immortal souls, the little mermaid gets her tongue cut out, and when she exchanges her fins for legs, every step she takes feels “as if treading upon the points of needles or sharp knives.”
But Moretz is all about making the film progressive.
