Review: Pieni merenneito

The Little Mermaid musical is a perfect success

Oops, it’s autumn! It’s pretty wonderful to come back here to tell you what’s going on, starting with the musical The Little Mermaid, which we got to experience this weekend. Two media tickets were received for the performance, the rest of the company’s tickets were purchased as usual.

On the weekend we celebrated our youngest’s birthday (already eight years old!) together with our cousins’ family and were looking forward to tonight’s performance at the Helsinki City Theatre. We had booked seats for the performance already in April and this show was worth waiting for. The musical The Little Mermaid is based on a fairy tale by H.C. Andersen and a Disney movie, so compared to the ballet we went to see in the spring, this musical was clearly meant for the whole family. While the ballet followed the original story exactly, it was also very distressing at times. Of course, in this musical, Ursula with her tentacles and a few other parts made the atmosphere tense for a while, but as our family’s soon-to-be eight-year-old said, nothing was too exciting.

The 11-year-old thought the performance was the best he had seen in a long time. Praise also came from 12- and 15-year-olds, as well as from us adults. The musical was absolutely fantastic, and it’s no wonder, as it used great flight technology, there were dolls from the makers of the Star Wars movies, the costumes were amazing, the video projections were so cool. Especially the world under the blood was super nicely made. Director Samuel Harjanne has stated that the musical The Little Mermaid is technically one of the most difficult works ever made here. I appreciate it.

The story differed from the original in that it wasn’t quite as tragic, and that’s a good thing, but there is still no lack of drama. Of course, Ariel wants to enter the world of people because of her love, but the world around her does not allow that to happen. Ariel even gives up her voice and defies her father in order to be who she feels she is, even for a moment. According to Harjanne, Ariel is the first feminist Disney princess! Go Ariel!

The songs and dances are super cool and funny, the art on the ceiling and suddenly on the floor also fools our adult viewers, this is wonderful magic. Splash does an absolutely amazing role and Chef Louise’s show was one of the funniest scenes in the musical.

We were delighted to meet Ariel and Prince Erik after the performance. This highlight ended an amazing evening, of which there was plenty to talk about and admire throughout the journey home and even after that. These experiences are happy to share with children, they will remember this even as adults. It’s absolutely amazing that it is possible to experience the same magic at the Helsinki City Theatre as on Broadway.