See Wicked’s Ariana Grande And Cynthia Erivo Freak Out When They Realize An Interviewer Is A Broadway Veteran

Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo looking into a mirror in Wicked
(Image credit: Universal Pictures)

The Wicked release date is just a week away, and in preparation for it, Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo have been all over the world promoting the movie musical and talking to all sorts of people. In one hilarious viral moment from the press tour, the actresses behind Glinda and Elphaba learned they were sitting across from a Broadway veteran, and their responses were too good!

As the two leads of the Wicked movie cast were interviewed for The Curvy Critic aka Carla Renata, its host spent the last moment of their time together to let them know that she is part of the Broadway community herself, sharing a connection she and Ariana Grande share. Check it out:

I think Ariana Grande might have blasted her microphone out by the sound of her surprised reaction. She yelled a loud “WHAT?” when Carla Renata revealed she was doing Avenue Q at the same time as Grande had just begun her career at the age of 15 in Broadway’s 13 back in 2008. Both Grande and Erivo were both just as surprised and fangirling over the interviewer being part of something they love so much: Avenue Q. The interaction only got better once Renata left her seat.

As Renata tried to walk out of the interview, she revealed that she was Gary Coleman on the musical comedy that serves as a parody for Sesame Street with a mix of human actors and puppets that’s one of those Broadway shows that has run for a crazy amount of time. Gary is one of the main characters in the musical who is a parody of the real-life child actor and becomes a maintenance man in Avenue Q.

As Renata continued to speak to the Wicked stars off camera, they were absolutely geeking over her and singing the words to the Avenue Q songs together. There’s no question these two are theater kids. Along with Carla Renata being on Avenue Q, Broadway fans might also be interested to know she has also been in renditions of The Lion King, How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying and Smokey Joe’s Cafe. She also played the role of Janet in Superstore and has found roles in shows like Hart Of Dixie and Shake It Up.

Funny enough, Avenue Q won the Tony for Best Musical back in 2004 over Wicked! Hence why Ariana Grande quipped that she had to share her love for the musical quietly. Grande and Erivo could not have reacted better to Renata’s little connection to Wicked, and the pair running from their seats feels like a reaction meme in the making.

It’s safe to say that Wicked is one of the most highly-anticipated 2024 movies, and it’ll be here in just a week when it hits theaters on November 22. (It doesn’t hurt that people are already loving it!) Now that Carla Renata and the leads have gone viral in this interview, we can’t wait for their reunion when the second part of Wicked comes out next year!

Sarah El-Mahmoud
Staff Writer

Sarah El-Mahmoud has been with CinemaBlend since 2018 after graduating from Cal State Fullerton with a degree in Journalism. In college, she was the Managing Editor of the award-winning college paper, The Daily Titan, where she specialized in writing/editing long-form features, profiles and arts & entertainment coverage, including her first run-in with movie reporting, with a phone interview with Guillermo del Toro for Best Picture winner, The Shape of Water. Now she's into covering YA television and movies, and plenty of horror. Word webslinger. All her writing should be read in Sarah Connor’s Terminator 2 voice over.