Ariana Grande Manifested Playing Glinda In Wicked For 20 Years
Oh, she really is a good witch!
Ariana Grande seems to have more in common with her spell-casting Wicked character than you realize. It may have been more than fate that Grande was so perfectly cast in the 2024 blockbuster movie, because she’s actually been putting it into the universe for decades that she needs to play Glinda. After fans were awed by her pink and popular polish in Wicked, a ton of Grande lore resurfaced highlighting how the singer has basically been auditioning for this part her entire life.
Grande’s connection with Wicked goes all the way back to her childhood, when her mom took her to see the stage show and she got to go back stage to meet the original Glinda, Kristin Chenoweth. Chenoweth shared the photo of her first meeting Grande when she was just a child to celebrate Grande’s casting in Wicked in 2021. “You were destined for this role,” Chenoweth wrote. She also sang a bit of “Popular” for Chenoweth that day. “I thought, ‘Well, you’re pretty good,” Chenoweth recalled in a later interview.
Around that same time, Grande actually starred in a local production of The Wizard of Oz as Dorothy, her brother Frankie revealed by sharing a pic. She’d go on to play Dorothy again in a 2012 episode of Victorious spoofing The Wizard of Oz.
Probably her biggest manifestation moment came in 2011, though, when she attended a production of Wicked at the Pantages Theater in Los Angeles, and tweeted that Glinda was her “dream role” afterwards. “Loved seeing Wicked again... amazing production! Made me realize again how badly I want 2 play Glinda at some point in my life! #DreamRole,” she wrote at the time.
She reiterated her passion for playing Glinda in several interviews throughout the 2010s, and even put her own spin on Glinda’s biggest number when she released “Popular Song” on her debut album in 2013. The collaboration with Mika samples “Popular” from Wicked, with Grande singing part of the stage number’s chorus.
She’s also straight-up covered Glinda’s songs quite a few times in social media videos. In 2016, she shared a clip of herself singing “No One Mourns the Wicked,” and in 2018, she recorded a video singing “For Good” in a mirror. In 2017, she performed “What Is This Feeling” on Carpool Karaoke: The Series with Seth MacFarlane.
Grande also developed a very close bond with Chenoweth a few years after their first meeting. In 2016, the two superstars reconnected when they were both cast in Hairspray Live!. The live musical experience forged a friendship between the two, which Grande spoke about when she picked Chenoweth to be an advisor to her The Voice team in 2021.
It all led to Chenoweth passing her wand on to Grande when the pop star was cast as Glinda later in 2021. And now that Wicked is finally out, the whole world can see what Grande has already known for her whole life: She was born to be Glinda.
