Ariana Grande is opening up about her relationship with Wicked costar Ethan Slater for the first time.
While sitting down with fellow lead, Cynthia Erivo for their Vanity Fair cover shoot, the 31-year-old pop star set the record straight about the Slater slander that made headlines throughout 2023.
“It definitely doesn’t get any easier, seeing some of the negativity that was birthed by disreputable tabloids,” Grande told the publication.
“Of course, I went through a lot of life changes during the filming of this movie. A lot of people that were working on it did. We were away for two years. So, of course, I understand why it was a field day for the tabloids to sort of create something that paid their bills,” she continued.
“The most disappointing part was to see so many people believe the worst version of it,” she said. “That was definitely a tough ride.”
Grande and Slater’s love story shocked the pop culture world. The Wicked costars found their names plastered across headlines in 2023 due to their relationship becoming public knowledge quickly following Grande’s split from Dalton Gomez.
In July, 2023 TMZ reported that Grande and Gomez had split in January. A few days later, sources told the outlet Grande and Slater started dating several months prior, with the two first meeting while shooting Wicked.
Slater had also split from his wife Lilly Jay, his high school sweetheart. Slater and Lilly filed for divorce six days after Slater was publicly linked to Grande. Per TMZ, the couple’s romance didn’t start until afterSlater’s separation from his now-ex wife, with whom he shares a son. Grande’s divorce from Gomez was finalized in October 2023, while Slater’s divorce finalized in September 2024.
The media and the public created this image of Slater as someone who, as the publication put it, stepped out on his wife and baby to date a pop star” — a narrative that Grande vehemently denies.
“There couldn’t be a less accurate depiction of a human being than the one that the tabloids spread about him,” Grande told Vanity Fair, before telling the reporter she would “never go into certain details.”
“No one on this earth tries harder or spreads themselves thinner to be there for the people that he loves and cares about. There is no one on this earth with a better heart, and that is something that no bulls–t tabloid can rewrite in real life,” she said.
Grande then recalled her own relationship with the tabloids, which she says have been “trying to destroy” her since she was “19-years-old.” While she admits he is “not a perfect person,” she is proud of who she is “becoming”.
“I will never let disreputable evil tabloids ruin my life or my perception of what is real and good,” she added.
Along with the cover shoot and in-depth interview with the publication ahead of Wicked: Part One hitting theaters in November, Grande and Erivo took the publication’s infamous celebrity lie-detector test. Grande was in the hot seat first with Erivo ensuring she asked every question she was given, which covered plastic surgeryto her complicated relationship with her fans.
When asked if she loves her fans, the “Eternal Sunshine” singer said “very much.”
“I love them aways but I think sometimes they can hurt my feelings and sometimes I don’t like them but I love them always,” Grande admitted.
“I think that sort of like weirdly para-social, it feels very real to me so sometimes it’s hard but I love them very much,” she doubled down before revealing that she often DMs her fans and how some have become close friends over the years.
“Yes it’s happen three times,” Grande recalled of becoming “close” friends with fans.
“Very close friend, like seven to 12 years of friendship in at this point,” she said of one before admitting that she is not the biggest fan of her fanbase name the “Arianators”
“No I don’t like it, I mean I’ve accepted it but would I pick that of course not, that’s insane,” she added.
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