Lin-Manuel Miranda has joined The Little Mermaid live action adaptation as a producer and songwriter.
The Hamilton star is teaming up with Alan Menken, who scored the original 1989 cartoon film, to create songs for the new movie.
Lin-Manuel will also produce the film and supervise the storyline alongside Marc Platt. Moviemakers are currently seeking a screenwriter.
The 36-year-old has long admired the animated film, telling Entertainment Weekly in December, “It’s the movie that’s probably most responsible for me being here. “I started taping the Oscars because I wanted to see Geoffrey Holder’s performance of Under the Sea.
That was the beginning of the end. Or, the beginning of the beginning, depending on how you look at it… I could sing you not only the songs in Little Mermaid but the music to the score. That’s how important those scores are in my life and in my upbringing.”
The actor is making his Disney songwriting debut on animated film Moana, which is due out in November. He will also play lamplighter Jack in the 2018 Mary Poppins sequel, which will star Emily Blunt as the magical nanny.
Meanwhile, this isn’t the only The Little Mermaid project in production — Kick-Ass star Chloe Grace Moretz will play the mermaid in a live-action version directed by Rebecca Thomas.
Shirley MacLaine has also signed up to star in an another upcoming live-action film based on Hans Christian Andersen’s fairytale, about a mystical sea siren who gives up her underwater life after she falls in love with a prince.
The new family film will feature child actress Loreto Peralta as a young orphan who discovers an enchanting creature, played by Poppy Drayton, who she believes to be the real Little Mermaid. MacLaine will play an eccentric woman who has intimate knowledge of the story.
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