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Jennifer Coolidgeis thankful forAriana Grande.
“I’m curious if you know that when people ask about how my life has changed,” she told Grande, 29, during their chat forEntertainment Weekly’s Entertainers of the Year issue. “Yes, I got to doWhite Lotus, but I think it really started with you asking me to be in the ‘Thank U, Next’ video.”
“I mean, from there I gotPromising Young Woman, and this whole thing. You were sort of the instigator,” she continued. “I really believe that. I think if you hadn’t put me in ‘thank u, next,’ and done that imitation, I don’t think I would be here where I am.”
Grande then told Coolidge that was “the most untrue thing I’ve ever heard in my life,” but the actress insisted that the video — in whichshe reprised herLegally BlondecharacterPaulette Bonafonté — changed the trajectory of her career.
“No, I really think that! And I think it’s pretty cool,” she said. “I was kind of flatlining, and you got things going for me.”
TheEmmy winneradded, “I just want to thank you. I know you’re a very humble person, you wouldn’t admit to it, but I’m just going to thank you.”
Cindy Ord/FilmMagic
Coolidge previously shared onThe Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallonin January that Grande’s impression of herpulled her out of a career “dead zone.”
Coolidge recounted Grande’s 2018 impression of her and explained how it led to a cameo in Grande’s “thank u, next” music video.
“You should know that it was sort of the beginning of a lot of cool things that happened for me because — I don’t know — I was going through a dead zone,” Coolidge shared. “Not much was going on, and then Ariana did this imitation on your show, and you encouraged her, and then this ball got rolling.”
Coolidge continued, “My friend who is like her age, Theresa, she was like, ‘You know, you should DM Ariana and just say I thought it was such a good imitation,’ and I was like, ‘No, she’s got like 260 million followers, those are robots! The robots answer the DMs, and we will never ever get to her.’ "
But she decided to message the singer regardless. “I did it anyway, and this response came back, and the next thing you know, I was going to her house, getting fit for a wardrobe fitting for ‘Thank U, Next.’ That was all because ofJimmy Fallon!”
Though Coolidge went on to major success with her starring roles in HBO’sThe White Lotus— which aired itssecond season finaleon Sunday — and Netflix’sThe Watcher.
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The first two seasons ofThe White Lotuscan be streamed in full on HBO Max, and the first season ofThe Watcheris available on Netflix.
source: people.com
