Halle Bailey Opens Up About How Filming 'The Little Mermaid' In London Helped Connect Her to Ariel

Halle Bailey really got into character while filming The Little Mermaid!

The 23-year-old star of the upcoming movie is opening up about how being isolated in London during the pandemic helped her connect to her character, Ariel.

“I found that a lot of my time in London was that I was feeling the exact way Ariel was feeling in the beginning of the story. It was my first time away from home, I grew up in a very big family. I am the baby of three girls and I have a baby brother. I lived in my parents’ home up until two years ago, and so I grew up always having people around, especially my siblings to guide me. My sister Chloe, who’s like a second mom to me, has always been there in my personal life and my career, holding my hand and guiding me through every step of life,” Halle shared with V Magazine. So this was the first project that I did by myself. When I found out I was cast, it was this shock of suddenly finding out that I’d have to move to London–and then the pandemic happened. So suddenly I found myself in London isolated by myself, the borders were closed, the world was shut down, and my family couldn’t even come visit me.”

Continue reading inside to see what else she said…

“I felt like I was thrown into a whole other world, and it was really cool because it almost helped me method-wise, to match what Ariel was going through because I literally felt so isolated. I was not suffocated in a bad way, but there was almost just that feeling of, ‘Here I am in this new place, everything is unknown and I wanna be somewhere else,’” Halle continued. “So it was really exciting to take that experience and apply it to what Ariel was feeling. And I was glad that it was happening that way because it was almost like somebody showing me exactly how she felt and what she was going through, because I was going through it as well. I honestly can say wholeheartedly that when I first started filming, I don’t think I knew my strength completely as an individual, as a young woman venturing out on her own, because I never got to do the college experience.”

“I believed in myself and that there was something greater for me—something greater on the other side of fear and the unknown,” she continued. “I remember at the end of filming, I felt like a completely different person. Even watching the little teaser and trailers come out, I look at them and I’m like, ‘Wow, do I know her anymore?’ Like to me, that’s a different girl, you know?”

If you missed it, see what Halle said about what Ariel and singing “Part of Your World” means to her…

Speaking of – Listen to the full version of Halle‘s “Part of Your World”!