Ariana Grande wants to return to the Broadway stage

I wonder, if Last Five Years happens to extend, if she and Ethan Slater would be willing to do a short stint. Also, she's obviously very close to JRB.

I also wonder about Jamie Lloyd's Evita...didn't someone say they were looking at a major start who would be returning to musical theatre after a long hiatus? She would definitely fit the bill. Physically she is perfect, vocally she would kill it...the only question is whether they would cast/she would be willing to play someone South American (even though her ethnic background is actually likely fairly similar to the real Eva's). If she's going to return to musicals, she is going to go big...doesn't get much bigger or harder than Evita.

If we could finally get a good book to Sweet Charity, I think her infectious personality would be well suited to the role.

Welcome back.....new shows need your star power more than ever.

Oh.

She mentions Sherie Rene Scott in Dirty Rotten Scoundrels in that interview and I think that would actually be a perfect role for her. Especially if she doesn’t want to have to carry the show entirely on her shoulders. Actually, her Wicked costars Jeff Goldblum and Jonathan Bailey would be perfect to headline it with her. But she could also just have someone (JRB?) write a show for her.

NOWaWarning said: "Actually, her Wicked costars Jeff Goldblum and Jonathan Bailey would be perfect to headline it with her."

That's genius.

She strikes me as in every possible way wrong for Charity, a woman who's been around the block more than once and has that tricky blend of vulnerability and street smarts that only comes with honest adult survival - i.e., a few more years. Nothing about her feels right, at least not in the next half a decade.

No one wants another Candide, but isn't she a Cunegonde? If the voices is a richly rangy as we've been told? I'd like to see her in something of substance, not popish fare.

singer234 said: "I DO however think Miley Cyrus would make a great Charity, even though they're about the same age."



Words have power. I beg you to not manifest horrors as ugly as this one.

Haha, to each their own. I happen to think she has an incredible unique voice that would suit the score well and is a natural physical comedienne. I think you can rest assured it won't happen.

Updated On: 11/8/24 at 01:12 PM

There's not really a well-fitted star vehicle for someone like Ariana, because she is this larger than life pop superstar, and a versatile character comedian, AND a gorgeous sex symbol. If Ariana were a guy, people would be talking about her like she was the second coming of Justin Timberlake. Instead, nobody is sure what to do with her, since mass media doesn't seem like it can handle a woman with all three of those boxes checked at once.

Watching her on SNL, I kept thinking of her fellow Nickelodeon alum Amanda Bynes, who was one of the very few female comedians to be allowed the level of versatility and chaos that male character comedians are allotted by default. (I've also long wondered if Anne Hathaway felt reined in by her restyle as a serious actress in the late 2000s, and yearned to let her goofy enthusiastic theatre kid side out again.) Bynes burned out before reaching her adult era the way Grande has, but the two of them managed a similar balance of a glamorous pop-star aesthetic plus a self-deprecating and chameleonic comedic identity as an actor. If things had turned out differently, I think we'd be talking about Bynes the way we talk about Kenan Thompson, as one of those people so gifted at stage comedy from an early age that they're a legend in their own time. Ariana Grande has that same long-gestating spark, but her pop success has made people forget it.

Auggie27 said: "No one wants another Candide, but isn't she a Cunegonde? If the voices is a richly rangy as we've been told? I'd like to see her in something of substance, not popish fare."

I'd like a good and silly production of Candide! Darko Tresnjak was supposed to direct it at Goodspeed and then Covid happened and it never got rescheduled. Which seems like an ideal match of director and venue.

Does Ariana actually have those notes though and, if so, could she sustain it 6-8x a week? That role is a TOUGH sing.

Was Christian Borle a big name in 2007?