Under the sea is the place to be and in-the-round is the way to experience its many magical wonders in The Nocturne Theatre gorgeously designed and swimmingly performed arena staging of Disney The Little Mermaid.

 Like the animated feature that re-started it all for Disney back in 1989, Broadway’s Little Mermaid’s recounts the classic Hans Christian Andersen tale of a sea sprite named Ariel (Jenna-Mae White) with dreams of walking on dry land (and down the aisle) with a Prince Charming named Eric (Ben Raanan).

Disney Studios added their trademark brand of supporting characters including Sebastian the Jamaican crab (Darius Aaron Frye), Flounder the blue-finned Flounder (Nicole Nelson), Scuttle the word-inventing seagull (Brendan Lynch), and Ursula the evil sea witch (Wesley Moran) and her aquatic henchmen Flotsam and Jetsam (Christian Lees and Jonah Lees), ocean creatures which the stage adaptation tweaks ever so slightly. (Flounder, for instance, now has an unrequited crush on Ariel.)

And since a movie running well under ninety minutes does not a full-length Broadway musical make, book writer Doug Wright has expanded (and occasionally revised) Ron Clements and John Musker’s screenplay, with Alan Menken and Glenn Slater adding a bunch of new songs to join the Menken/Howard Ashman classics “Part Of Your World,” “Under The Sea,” and “Kiss The Girl.”

The result of all this masterful tinkering is a musical theater crowd-pleaser that may not follow the movie to the letter (gone, for example, is Ursula’s transformation into an Ariel-voiced “Vanessa”) but fleshes out characters with catchy new songs.

Adding to the Broadway pizzazz at the Nocturne are musical numbers choreographed with a seaload of imagination and flair by Taylor Smith that give us a oceanful of cavorting underwater creatures in “Under The Sea” and a flock of tap-dancing seagulls to do Gregory Hines, Fred Astaire, and Gene Kelly proud in “Positoovity,” to name just two of the show’s showstopping production numbers.

Not only that, but this The Little Mermaid features quite possibly the most spectacularly designed Little Mermaid costumes ever (another Nocturne triumph for Tanya Cyr), under-the-sea-wear that outshines any other collection I’ve seen. (No longer do audiences have to imagine that Ariel and her sisters have fins that go from their waists to the tip of their finned tails.)

Justin Myers’ direction is as flairful as it gets, and the performances he has elicited are fresh new takes on those in the beloved Disney animated feature.

UK-gift-to-Glendale White is as incandescent (and power-piped) as she is filled with rebellious, romantic mermaid moxie and she couldn’t ask for a dreamier Prince Eric than rising star (and actual Angelino) Raanan, who’s got a tenor to die for.

Fryes’ Jamaicalicious Sebastian proves himself a master scene-stealer, as does Moran’s dragolicious, scenery-chewing Ursula, aided and abetted by the identical (and identically talented) Lees twins as two of the cutest serpentine minions ever to segway across a stage.

Nelson’s dorkadorable Flounder, Lynch’s wild and wacky Scuttle, and Andrew Gaxiola’s exuberant Chef Louis deliver the most delightful of supporting turns while girl-group harmonizing sextet Catherine Ballantyne (Aquata), Chelsea Carroll (Attina), Tara Cox (Arista), Taylor Foster (Adella), Kasey Hentz (Adrina), and Abhaya Krishnan-Jha (Allana) make for six of the quirkiest and most alluring “mersisters” ever in addition to scoring laughs as Princesses attempting to outdo each other’s’ “vocal gifts” in “The Contest.”

 Completing the all-around fabulous cast are Glendale Centre Theatre vet/Nocturne favorite Thwaits’ imposingly bare-chested Triton (just wait until he joins voices with White, Raanan, and Frye in a simply sublime “If Only (Quartet)”), J.D. Wallis’s warmly avuncular Grimsby, multitasker Andreas Pantazis doing everything from piloting Prince Eric’s ship to adding to the taptastic delights of “Positoovity,” and Lisa-Marie Burnside and Kimberly Butler showing off aerialist gifts galore.

Jay Michael Roberts and Max give us a scenic design that’s as ingenious as all get-out (I love how Ariel’s “treasures” are displayed inside underwater bubbles) and one that looks even more dazzling under Meyer’s brilliant saturated lighting design.

Last but not least, music director Chris Wade has the entire cast vocalizing and harmonizing to perfection to prerecorded tracks.

Disney The Little Mermaid is produced by Melissa Meyer and Justin Meyer. Micah Delhauer is assistant lighting designer and stage manager. Matt Merline is sound engineer. Julia Vollstedt is assistant stage manager.

Over the past two-and-a-half years, The Nocturne Theatre has made itself an invaluable part of the L.A. musical theater scene, and I can’t think of a more thrilling follow-up to their dark-and-edgy Jesus Christ Superstar than its polar (or should that be tropical?) opposite Disney The Little Mermaid.

Whether you’re a tiny tot or long past retirement age, expect to find yourself falling under Ariel and company’s magic spell.

The Nocturne Theatre, 324 N. Orange St., Glendale. Through June 28. See website for detailed performance schedule.
www.TheNocturneTheatre.com

–Steven Stanley
May 8, 2026
Photos: Brian Ian

Visit www.theatreinla.com/nowplayingrs.php for a review roundup of what’s now playing in theaters around Los Angeles.

Tags: Alan Menken, Howard Ashman, Los Angele Theater Review, The Nocturne Theatre