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The face of Ursula—the villainous sea witch of The Little Mermaid infamy—might feel uniquely familiar to a child of the ‘70s—or the ‘80s, for that matter. The original character in the 1989 movie was inspired by the triple threat drag queen, actor, and singer Divine, a fact that was mere speculation at first, but has since been confirmed by those involved with the film.
Divine catapulted to cult fame after appearing in Pink Flamingos, John Waters’ filthy 1972 comedy. With his signature look—an unnaturally high hairline with gigantic eyebrows and over-the-top makeup, crafted by the makeup artist Van Smith—Divine resembled Ursula. To Waters, who met Divine when they were teens in the outskirts of Baltimore and became his close friend and creative partner, the similarities between Divine and Ursula go beyond the corporeal. Divine took what the world used against him, Waters says, and exaggerated it.
“Ursula was an outsider. She was magic. She had a style that some people might not understand,” Waters tells TIME. “But she was proud of herself. She was confident. She never questioned her look. She never felt—as other people might have—that she looked weird or anything. She looked beautiful on her own terms.”
Ursula will return to screen on May 26 in Disney’s live-action Little Mermaid, with Melissa McCarthy playing the witch with campy, raspy relish. At the film’s premiere in early May, the actor acknowledged Divine’s influence on the character.
“I’ve watched The Little Mermaid more times than any other movie,” McCarthy said. “I was a nanny, and we used to watch it every night. And I always was like, I know for a fact—but I couldn’t prove it—that she had to be based on Divine. She just had to be. I was like, ‘the makeup, the look, the attitude.’ And now we know that yes, she was of course…
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