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Starting tonight, Selma is ‘Under the Sea’

Calling all fishes and their friends: It’s opening night for the Selma Arts Center production of “The Little Mermaid.”

The show, which opens 7 p.m. Friday, May 11, and continues through May 26, is the musical based on the Disney film.

I featured Maria Monreal, who plays Ariel, and Joshua Plowman, who plays Prince Eric, on the May episode of “The Munro Review.” They sat down to talk with me a little about the production and then performed a musical number:

Tidbits from the interview:

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♦ On Broadway, the production team decided to depict “swimming” by putting the cast on Heelys, those shoes with wheels built in. (They’re the contraption of choice when you’re walking down the street and suddenly a small child suddenly glides by you, making you think you’re in a “Harry Potter” moment.) The Selma Arts Center production decided to expand on that idea by featuring a bunch of different kind of wheeled vehicles. “It’s a really cool and extremely simple effect,” Monreal says.

♦ Prince Eric didn’t sing in the movie, but Plowman is happy that the musical version is different. “I thought it was really fun that in the Broadway show they added some songs for him,” he says.

♦ Monreal is excited to get to play a Disney princess, because when she was growing up, they were off-limits to her because of her ethnicity. “The fact that I get to play a Disney princess now, and someone who has such an iconic look as Ariel, is amazing to me. It’s not something I dreamed that I could do. I think it’s going to be important for other little girls to see a production like this.”

Watch and enjoy!


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Covering the arts online in the central San Joaquin Valley and beyond. Lover of theater, classical music, visual arts, the literary arts and all creative endeavors. Former Fresno Bee arts critic and columnist. Graduate of Columbia University and Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. Excited to be exploring the new world of arts journalism.

donaldfresnoarts@gmail.com

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