Ariana Grande teases upcoming project with ‘many elements’

After the gravity-defying success of Wicked, what’s next for Ariana Grande?

“There are other things I’m really looking forward to in the future,” the 32-year-old actress and musician teased in a new interview with Variety. “I can’t say much yet, but it’s something that deeply inspires me.”

Her next project, she adds curiously, “includes a number of elements.”

Grande Erivo and Cynthia Erivo led Jon M. Chu’s two-part musical adaptation of Broadway’s Wicked. Grande, who reprized her role as Glinda from Oz in Wicked: For Good, received nominations for the Golden Globe, Critics Circle Award, and Best Actor for the second year in a row.

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“It’s incredibly surreal,” Grande told Variety when asked about being forever known as the Academy Award-nominated performer since last year’s Wicked: Part 1. “It hasn’t hit me yet. It feels like a warm welcome into a community that I really love. I love acting. I love acting. I love talking about acting and learning about other people’s processes and my own. It’s life-changing and I’ll never take it for granted.”

Once again teasing what on-screen projects are coming up, the “Yes, And?” singer said, “I want to play roles that flex different muscles and challenge myself to do something new…I’m drawn to things that feel different.”

Grande’s two currently announced projects, a season of American Horror Story and Fokker in Law (in theaters November 25th) with Ben Stiller and Robert De Niro, fit the brief to give her something different after playing Glinda. “See you soon,” she promised.

The Grammy winner also has a tour scheduled to begin in June 2026 to promote his 2024 album Eternal Sunshine. But she also told Amy Poehler during an appearance on the Good Hang podcast in November that the tour “might never happen again for a long, long time.”

As Grande teased during a Q&A in November, there could be more Elphaba and Glinda characters following the critical and commercial success of Wicked and its sequel. “First of all, no one is going anywhere,” she said in a video uploaded to Instagram. “We’re not saying goodbye to anything. These characters will always be a part of our hearts. They irrevocably and forever changed our lives, and I’m so grateful for that.”