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Is Ariana Grande Going to Be Stuck Like This Forever?
Grande’s borderline-Method commitment to being Glinda is admirable and hilarious, but what’s the larger endgame here?
There’s a rich history of actors making a strange commitment to character during their press tours, awards-related or otherwise: Jim Carrey becoming Andy Kaufman, Bradley Cooper becoming Maestro, whatever random voice Tom Hardy decides to do every year. As Grande told Teen Vogue, “I needed to disappear into this role.” Glinda — first portrayed onscreen by Billie Burke in Victor Fleming’s adaptation of The Wizard of Oz and first played onstage in Wicked by Kristin Chenoweth — is defined by a few broad-strokes character traits: a saccharine sweetness, a penchant for public good, and always wearing pink. Once you watch Wicked, it becomes clear that Grande is performing a full-body extension of her character on the press trail — a hammy personality akin to the likes of Barbra Streisand or Sutton Foster.
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