‘Playing the wrong witch’: The Ariana Grande vs. Elvira feud is stunningly passive-aggressive
Celeb feuds can be pretty fun sometimes, especially when they’re over next to nothing, as is the case with the Ariana Grande vs. Elvira feud. Let’s recap: Ariana Grande is, apparently, a bad guest. Elvira named her as such while being interviewed for Knott’s Scary Farm event, and she held nothing back.
Grande had, according to Elvira (whose real name is Cassandra Peterson) once come to an event of hers and demanded 21 tickets. Whether or not she paid for them, or if they were freebies, is left unsaid. Grande’s multiple guests then took pictures with Elvira and had her sign autographs for them, but when Elvira wanted a picture with Grande herself, the singer allegedly said, “Nah, I don’t really do that.” Elvira imitated Grande’s voice, and the crowd booed at the thought of the younger star disrespecting the Mistress of the Dark. One panel member joked that Grande was “playing the wrong witch,” a reference to her role as Glinda the Good Witch in Wicked. She’s not so good, was the implication there.
When all is said and done, that’s a fairly minor slight. But Grande’s fans, like Elvira’s, weren’t about to take it lying down. Elvira’s Instagram post was soon flooded with comments from Arianators (yeah, I know, I haven’t heard that nickname since the ’10s either) who were LIVID at Elvira. “Was rent past due? Hope you got the attention you wanted,” came one remark. Quite a few others suggested Elvira should “grow up” despite the fact the woman is 73, people!
Then Grande herself came swooping into the comments section:
“i’m so disheartened to see this. i actually don’t even remember getting the chance to meet you because i had an anxiety attack and to my memory, left before the rest of my family (this was around 7 years ago and at the time i was really not great with being in public crowds or loud places) … but if i’m misremembering this moment, i sincerely apologize for offending you so.”
She’s making clear reference here to the Manchester terror attack on her concert in 2017, a terrible event that killed 22 people, some of them children. The event understandably devastated the singer and she suffered post-traumatic stress disorder over it. Fair enough if that’s why she left early. No one would (or at least no one should) begrudge her that.
Grande’s next words, however, were not likely to assuage Elvira fans, as they were rather passive-aggressive. “thank you for being so nice to my mom, she told me how lovely you were (she might have different feelings about that now but i’ll talk to her … clearly, we all have our days!)” she wrote. Ouch! So now she’s letting Elvira know that her mom doesn’t like her anymore. That’s not really a necessary thing to bring up, right?
The starlet signed off with, “sending love always. you’ll always be our queen of halloween!”
Elvira has yet to respond to any of this, but fans on both sides have positively taken up arms now. A glance at the wilds of X/Twitter will tell you all you need to know. You’ve got the Elvira fans who are defending their queen and furious at the implication from Ariana Grande fans that she’s a nobody:
And then you’ve got the Arianators who think Elvira should never have brought the matter up.
In conclusion: It’s sad when celebrity ladies fight! Come on, everyone, make up. Do it for Halloween and for Wicked!
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