The Little Mermaid star Pat Carroll, who voiced Disney villain Ursula in the animated movie, has passed away aged 95 following complications from pneumonia.
One of her daughters, Kerry Karsian, confirmed that Carroll died on July 30 at her home in Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Her other daughter, Tara Karsian, later posted a tribute to the Emmy-winning actor on Instagram. “It s with a heavy heart that I write that my mother, Pat Carroll, has passed away at the grand old age of 95,” she wrote.
“We ask that you honour her by having a raucous laugh at absolutely anything today (and every day forward) because, besides her brilliant talent and love, she leaves my sister Kerry and I with the greatest gift of all, imbuing us with humour and the ability to laugh…even in the saddest of times.” Born on May 5, 1927, Carroll started acting from the age of five, appearing in productions local to her hometown, Louisiana, before appearing in her first movie, entitled Hometown Girl, in 1948.
She acted in a string of sitcoms and TV series across the ’50s, ’60s, and ’70s, before winning a Grammy for her one-woman show —Gertrude Stein, Gertrude Stein, Gertrude Stein — in 1980.
With The Little Mermaid also being a musical, Carroll became known for singing the now-iconic Disney song, ‘Poor Unfortunate Souls,’ while also continuing to voice Ursula in other related Disney projects like spin-offs, sequels, and even theme park rides. In an interview cited by the Evening Standard, she described the character of Ursula as “fascinating.”
“‘She’s a mean old thing! I think people are fascinated by mean characters,” she said. “There’s a fatal kind of distraction about the horrible mean characters of the world because we don’t meet too many of them in real life. So when we have a chance, theatrically, to see one and this one, she’s a biggie; it’s kind of fascinating for us”
Carrol is survived by her two daughters — Kerry and Tara — and her granddaughter, Evan Karsian-McCormick.