Ariana Grande Says Her Glinda Voice "Might Stay" Even After Wicked

Ariana Grande’s Glinda-fied new voice has been a popular topic of conversation throughout the Wicked press run, and now Grande is saying that the vocal change may be permanent. Fans first noticed Grande had begun to speak in a higher pitched, theatrically enunciated tone early in 2024, and she’s been consistently speaking in this way ever since. Grande explained that the sonic shift is a result of how much work she put into becoming Glinda.

“Maybe people underestimate how long we spent finding and disappearing into these women,” Grande told Variety on Jan. 2. “So when certain inflections or mannerisms take time to melt away, sometimes people poke fun. But we had a job to do, and we had things to get lost in — because that’s what the piece required.”

But what about when the second Wicked film arrives in theaters at the end of 2025? Will Grande still speak like Glinda after the whole project is officially done?

“I think that might stay,” Grande said. “Galinda required a lot of vocal work for me. Certain things maybe won’t melt away. Some will, but I’m really grateful for the pieces that will stay with us forever. What a beautiful thing to be left with, and to feel the ghost of every day.”

Grande has previously expressed her distaste for the chatter around her dialect change, pointing out a gendered divide in how voice work is generally received.

“There is a part of the world that isn’t familiar with what it takes to transform your voice, whether it’s singing or taking on a different dialect for a role or doing a character voice for something,” Grande told Vanity Fair in a Sept. 30 cover story. “When it’s a male actor that does it, it’s acclaimed. There are definitely jokes that are made as well, but it’s always after being led with praise: ‘Oh, wow, he was so lost in the role.’ And that’s just a part of the job, really.”

But she felt her changed voice didn’t get the same fanfare as, say, Austin Butler’s widely talked-about Elvis accent. “Tale as old as time being a woman in this industry,” Grande said. “You are treated differently, and you are under a microscope in a way that some people aren’t.”