Ariana Grande says Mac Miller "encouraged her to be herself" as she moved into music
The Wicked actress has recalled her experiences leaving Nickelodeon sitcom Sam and Cat as she started working on her 2013 debut album Yours Truly, and her late ex-boyfriend - who she dated from 2016 to 2018 - encouraged her to "shed that character" and move on.
17 January 2026
Speaking on The Hollywood Reporter's Awards Chatter podcast, she said: "I've never talked about this, but actually Malcolm, whom you might know as Mac, encouraged me to be myself. "And that it was OK to kind of shed that character, and embrace my brown hair, and make R B-influenced pop music and separate and do the brave thing.
"I never said that. But it was a great influence, I'm so very grateful for that."
She featured Miller on her lead single The Way, as a nod to the influence he had on her music.
She added: "Not only because he was so perfect for the song, but I also felt like I had him to thank for finding my sound."
Ariana and Miller split just six months before he died in an accidental overdose aged 26 in September 2018, and she has paid tribute to him over the years.
In 2020, she told Apple Music: "I think that nothing mattered more to him than music ever. "And he was the kind of person who woke up and rolled into the studio, tumbled out of bed, into the studio next door.
"Nothing was more important. Talk about losing track of time and forgetting to eat, remind yourself to take care of yourself and be a person.
"He was a person who gave literally every single second of his thought and time and life to his music."
Ariana also pointed to the "many incredible and different bodies of work" he left behind.
She had previously reflected on the grief she felt when he passed, acknowledging that while their relationship wasn't "perfect", she still thought he was "the best person ever".
She told Vogue magazine in 2019: "By no means was what we had perfect, but, like, f***. He was the best person ever, and he didn't deserve the demons he had.
"I was the glue for such a long time, and I found myself becoming... less and less sticky. The pieces just started to float away."
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