About

Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo Crying on the Wicked Press Tour refers to memes and discussions about singer Ariana Grande and actress Cynthia Erivo's behavior during the press junket for the musical Wicked. In late 2024, internet users noticed that the two leads had a tendency to get overly emotional and teary during several press interviews, leading many to speculate about the actresses' mental and physical health. An interview where Cynthia Erivo reacts emotionally to hearing that queer people are "holding space" using lyrics from the song "Defying Gravity" garnered particular attention in late November 2024, around the same time TikTokers began making videos satirizing the duo's press appearances.

Origin

The earliest known notable instance of Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo crying during the Wicked press tour was a November 8th, 2024 appearance on the YouTube^[1] channel Jake's Takes. At roughly the 6-minute mark, Grande and Erivo are asked about how they changed each other's lives, causing Ariana to tear up and get emotional.

On November 9th, the two appeared in a segment with E! News^[2] where they vowed to stop crying in press interviews, saying that they were annoyed by it too.

Spread

On November 12th, X^[3] user @greatestselena posted a tweet compiling several interviews where both Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo appeared emotional and leaked a tear, writing, "are they okay" and gathering over 29,000 likes in ten days.

are they okay pic.twitter.com/ze6Yl79QOj

— ‎ً (@greatestselena) November 13, 2024

On November 13th, TikToker^[4] @newspeoplefyp posted a compilation of the two crying during the Wicked press tour, gathering over 4 million plays and 700,000 likes in a week. On November 14th, Redditor^[5] /u/Rude_Lifeguard reposted the compilation to Reddit, gathering over 1,000 upvotes in a week.

On November 16th, several Twitter users began speculating that Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo may be suffering from eating disorders, claiming that they too suffered from the same emotional volatility when they were anorexic.

X^[6] user @full_legal_name wrote, "the shit ur brain does when ur starving is so crazy 😭😭😭 when i was anorexic i couldn’t look at my drivers license bcuz i would start crying about how beautiful the concept of organ donation was." The post gathered over 240,000 likes in a week.

On November 21st, a video of Cynthia Erivo reacting to news that people were "holding space" using the lyrics to the song Defying Gravity went viral on X, with people expressing bemusement and confusion over what the conversation meant.

X^[7] user @danieldayliuis gathered over 66,000 likes on a tweet that read, "I’m completely mesmerized by this clip .. it’s almost like they are speaking a language I don’t understand . I can’t catch the sense of it for a single moment. I’m not understanding the words or the feelings or the energy at all. It’s amazing," while @dayglowj0e^[8] gathered over 12,000 likes for a quote tweet that read, "you’re laughing? people are taking the lyrics of defying gravity and really holding space with that and you’re laughing?"

you’re laughing? people are taking the lyrics of defying gravity and really holding space with that and you’re laughing? https://t.co/ckZteRYJO4

— seosamh 🇵🇸 (@dayglowj0e) November 21, 2024

On November 28th, 2025, Redditor u/_H3LLF1R3 posted a meme to the subreddit^[11] /r/memevideos, showing Ariana Grande telling a helicopter to move while Cynthia Erivo gets emotional during an interview, edited to depict them as Vietnamese rice farmers. The post gathered over 23,000 upvotes in three days.

🚁
byu/_H3LLF1R3 inMemeVideos

TikTok Presence

Several TikTokers posted videos parodying the duo's emotional interview moments, as seen in a TikTok^[9] posted on November 13th, 2024 which gathered over 8 million plays and 1 million likes in two weeks.

On November 21st, TikToker^[10] @siennahubertross gathered over 11 million plays and 1.8 million likes on a video poking fun at the duo's press interviews.

Search Interest

Unavailable.

External References