Ariana Grande tries to keep her personal life private, but it always threatens to overshadow her talent.
The star has a new tour, a new album planned, and is set to star in one of Hollywood’s most beloved comedy series.
But this week, Grande, 32, found herself back in the spotlight for a different reason. She broke up with her boyfriend Ethan Slater, 34, with whom she had been together for about three years.
Sources told Page Six that the couple broke up “several” months ago, but that they had actually been “on and off” for some time before that.
When rumors of the pair’s falling out first surfaced in the fall, one of Grande’s friends told Us: “If you had to look into my crystal ball, would you think we would stay together? No.”
So what was wrong with Slater?
Grande, who hosts the holiday show “Saturday Night Live,” drew gasps when she showed up to meet him on Dec. 20.
The couple hadn’t been seen together in weeks, and an onlooker at the dress rehearsal attended by Page Six said, “I thought they had broken up.”
“People were definitely surprised that Ethan showed up,” a TV source told Us, “no one expected them to be together… They were on off, on off, on off.”
A photo of the two from SNL was posted on Instagram by Grande’s friend Elizabeth Gillies, and Slater shared a glimpse of his “super fun” vacation with Grande that same month. However, that was the last photo of the two together.
Grande and Slater, 34, a prominent Broadway performer, were accused of being “cheaters” shortly after they started dating while Slater was working on the London set of blockbuster film Wicked with his then-wife and young son.
It was first confirmed that the two were dating in July 2023. Three days after Grande announced the breakup of her marriage to husband Dalton Gomez, Slater’s estranged wife, Dr. Lily Jay, labeled her husband’s news-queer a “no girl.”
“My family is just collateral damage,” Jay wrote in an essay for The Cut, turning to Page Six about how his life was forever changed by Slater’s romance with Grande.
“I took the leap of faith to move to another country to support my two-month-old baby and my husband’s career. I was so caught up in the magic and mundanity of new motherhood that I couldn’t understand the growing distance between us,” she wrote.
Sources say Grande sometimes has a hard time keeping up with herself, both at work and in her personal life.
“Professionally, Ali is great to work with and she’s very talented. As a person, she can be… needy,” said an industry expert who worked with the former child star.
Another source who knows Grande also insisted, “There was no cheating…Neither of them should have been branded as cheaters. It’s not like neither of them are cheaters.”
Grande’s ex-fiancé, comedian Pete Davidson, also came to her defense. Friends of the former “Saturday Night Live” star say Grande remains extremely protective of her, although they haven’t spoken in a while.
“She’s been through a lot in her life. Pete has a lot of respect for her. She just keeps working and continuing to exceed herself,” a friend said.
Grande and Davidson famously got engaged just weeks after starting dating in May 2018, celebrating with matching tattoos and Davidson lavishing her with a $93,000 ring as a token of their love. However, they split in October of that year, just a month after Grande was left shaken by the drug overdose death of her ex-boyfriend, rapper Mac Miller, 26.
Grande revealed in January that Miller encouraged her to step out of the shadow of Nickelodeon character Cat Valentine on her 2013 debut album, Yours Truly.
“We’ve never talked about this, but Malcolm (you may know him as Mac) actually encouraged me to be who I am,” she said on The Hollywood Reporter’s Awards Chatter podcast. “And that it was OK to shed that persona and embrace my brown hair and make R&B-influenced pop music and separate and do brave things.”
Further echoing Miller’s advice, the “Seven Rings” singer added, “That was a huge influence. I’m really grateful.”
She married Gomez, a luxury real estate agent, in May 2021 in a private ceremony with less than 20 guests at his home in Montecito, California. Gomez reportedly flew to London to save her marriage, but the divorce was finalized in March 2014.
Grande appeared to ignore the uproar surrounding her relationship with Slater, defending their romance in her 2024 song “Yes, And?” It comes with the lyrics, “Your business is yours and mine is mine. Why do you care so much whose car I get in?”
However, things went awry by the time Grande and Slater embarked on a global press tour for the Wicked sequel, Wicked: For Good, late last year, and they reportedly stayed away from each other at the premiere.
Slater, who played Bock in the film based on the hit musical, declined to discuss Grande, who received praise and an Oscar nomination for her role as Glinda the Good Witch.
Notably, he sidestepped Today show host Craig Melvin’s question in November 2025 about how he “works with[his]girlfriend every day,” instead praising “the entire cast” of the film as “incredible.”
He called Grande “amazing” and co-star Cynthia Erivo “amazing” in an interview, adding, “I’m so proud of everyone I’ve gotten to work with. We’re like family.”
Slater was absent from the opening show of Grande’s Eternal Sunshine tour, which kicked off last weekend at California’s Oakland Arena, but he showed his support with a Like on Instagram.
During the show, Grande famously poked fun at her failed marriage to Gomez and sang about her exes, including Davidson, Miller and Big Sean, while singing her 2019 hit “Thank U Next.”
The lyrics include, “One day I’ll walk down the aisle / Holding your mom’s hand… I want to do it just once, but it’s so bad / Make sure you do it all the way.”
After singing “I Just Want to Do It Once, I Really Bad,” on Saturday, Grande playfully held up two fingers and laughed, apparently referring to her openness to remarrying.
This weekend, Grande played two sold-out shows at Crypto Arena in downtown Los Angeles.
A source who knows Grande says Grande is cautious about letting new people into her inner circle, and that she and her brother Frankie Grande have a tight-knit group of friends and like to play board games together at home. She is famously obsessed with Monopoly.
“She doesn’t want to go out much. She’s much happier at home with her friends,” the source said.
This November, Grande will also promote “Focker-in-Law,” the sequel to the blockbuster film “Meet the Fockers,” starring Ben Stiller and Robert De Niro. She plays Olivia Jones, an intimidating former FBI hostage negotiator and future bride of Henry Focker, the son of Stiller and Teri Polo’s characters.
Stiller, who is also a director, described Grande as a “great comedic actress” and “the whole engine” of the new film.
And despite her breakup with Slater, don’t expect her to go all Taylor Swift and sing about her ex on her new album, Petal, friends say.
“She and Ethan are still friends. It’s not a dramatic breakup, it’s not like that at all… It didn’t happen overnight. It was a thoughtful decision. They haven’t lost communication,” one friend said.
Of her new album, a friend said, “This isn’t about romantic love. This is Ali’s way with every headline.”
