Chatter and laughter filled the Seward County Community College showcase theater, as grade school students sat next to their parents anxiously waiting for the “The Little Mermaid” adaptation to begin.

On April 5, 6 and 7, the SCCC Humanities department showcased  “The Little Mermaid” for students and the public to go watch and enjoy. The musical was filled with iconic songs from the movie and had the audience genuinely laughing from the beginning to end.

“The Little Mermaid” is a tale about a young girl who feels like she doesn’t quite fit in. Ariel states multiple times how the sea will never be her home and never will feel like it. Ariel’s only dying wish is to be able to live on land with humans who walk and dance, even though her father strongly disagrees with it and finally, to marry her one true love, Prince Eric.

The first note of the first song that opened scene one of the musical introduced Ariel, played by Madelyn Sander, sitting on a rock singing with her beautiful, enchanting voice and Prince Eric, played by Moises Alvarez, on his ship accompanied by the other men. Prince Eric notices Ariel’s voice and immediately feels the urge to find the beautiful girls voice.

Through the musical, Ariel acts like a typical troubled teen and such a drama queen, who seems deeply misunderstood by her father, King Triton, played by community member David Adams. I’m sure many of us could relate to Ariel on an emotional level, maybe once having feelings of being misunderstood by our parents ourselves.

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Rubi Gallegos

Ursula, played by community member Heather Powell, is accompanied by her two minions, Flotsam and Jetsam. Flotsom is played by Biviana Rodriguez and Jetsam by Alondra Loza.

The story continues and most importantly, Ariel has the best gift of all, her mother’s voice. Now, if you’ve watched the movie, well you know what happens. Her evil aunt, Ursula, tricks the young girl into trading her voice for a chance at true love with Prince Eric. Honestly, Ariel is dumb for this but we all saw it coming. But, that was one scene I can clearly remember from watching the movie as a child and it was played out perfectly.

The actors and actresses–who are not pros and for some this was their first big lead–gave each character justice but especially Ursula, who was played by community member Heather Powell, and Ariel, but equally everyone did an astounding job getting into character. 

Sebastian, who is played by Mikayla Knudson, sung an amazing lead on the song “Under The Sea” which had a lot of work put into it during rehearsals, as I had witnessed before. This scene was super hilarious because while Sebastian was singing this, the rest of the cast slowly disappeared out of sight only leaving him to sing by himself.

My favorite part of the musical was towards the end, when Prince Eric and Ariel were on a boat and Sebastian tries to set the mood by singing “Kiss The Girl” which doesn’t completely work but it was so wholesome and cute to me.

The most climatic part of the musical was when King Triton went to the rescue for his daughter and sacrificed his position as king to win his Ariel back. Here is where I feel the actors and actresses true talents shined through, with such a tumultuous scene. It was intense, it was heated and it was everything you could think of when you think of a climax. The actors made sure to put in raw emotion and passion into the songs and scenes where they were sad, serious or angry, you could see the emotion clearly which is what made every scene enjoyable.

Last but not least, there was also a kissing seen at the very end! It was everything the audience hoped to happen between Ariel and Prince Eric and once the play was over, the cast got a standing ovation.

So to say the least, it was actually a very well rehearsed and very well executed musical. The songs were great, the outfits matched the characters quite well and also let me just say the background of the set was painted so beautifully! The attention to detail was just so obvious in everything. I give the musical a ⅘ Crusader rating!