After the "Wicked" press junket, Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo responded to the weird "holding space" meme.
The 31-year-old pop artist and 37-year-old stage and film personality discussed the cringeworthy Out Magazine interview with Tracy E. Gilchrist with Variety on Friday.
Gilchrist said "Defying Gravity" had people "taking the lyrics" and "really holding space with that."
According to Daily Mail, Cynthia and her costar Ariana said they had "no idea" what Gilchrist was talking about when they responded in her latest interview with Ariana and director Jon M. Chu.
"I was surprised, because I had no idea, because I hadn't been looking," Cynthia acknowledged Gilchrist's social media inspiration.
"Well, I guess," Ariana said of the journalist's response to the claimed postings.
"I had no idea that this thing was going on," Cynthia reiterated in her Variety interview.
"So I didn't know what any part of it meant," Ariana said more bluntly."I didn't understand the first sentence. And then I definitely didn't understand what was happening, how you responded."
She continued: "I was like, 'Oh, what did she say, and what did you hear?' And I just wanted to be there for Cynthia, because I knew something big was happening, and I didn't know how to be there."
To support the meme, the revised interview added footage of Ariana oddly clutching Cynthia's index finger.
"But then, after a while, I didn't know how to be there," Cynthia responded as their director couldn't contain his chuckles.
"She said something that meant something to her, then it meant something totally different to you, then she tried to get somewhere else," Ariana tried to explain. "And the craziest thing was, I remember in the moment asking myself, Am I OK? Did I not hear something?"
"Because Cynthia looks like she's about to cry again and I'm about to grab her finger because I think she might need something, and I don't know what the tapping her finger is about," she added.
"Tension," Cynthia suggested.
Then Cynthia said she was thrown off by Gilchrist's announcement that she worked in "queer media."
"I honestly didn't know what that meant. And, am I also in queer media? Maybe?" she added in puzzlement.
Ariana was more upbeat and claimed she was "relieved" that others had the same "experience" with the interview.
Because I felt like, "Oh, I'm not broken," she added.
Cynthia switched gears and liked the New York City Gay Men's Chorus music-set interview. Ariana said she hadn't seen it, then corrected herself to mock Gilchrist.
"Yeah, well, I've seen it," she said, echoing Gilchrist's claim that she had "seen" the mysterious, hard-to-articulate social media posts that allegedly inspired her original line of questioning.
The director of "Wicked" said he was in "the other room" when Ariana and Cynthia conducted their original interview, but he quipped that he sensed a meme taking life.
Social media has been abuzz with reactions to the "holding space" meme, as users comment on the humor and awkwardness of the scenario.
"Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande trying to decode that question is the comedy gold I didn't know I needed!" one netizen said.
"Ariana holding Cynthia's finger like it's a life raft has me in tears. Pure chaos!" another person quipped.
"The real MVP here is the journalist. That question will go down in awkward interview history!" a third wrote.
"Cynthia asking 'Am I in queer media?' is officially my favorite meme of 2024," a fourth fan chimed in.
"Ariana's face when she said, 'I didn't understand the first sentence,' is priceless. This is why I love her," another fan said.
"The finger-holding moment will live rent-free in my mind forever. Someone please frame it for me," another fan wrote.
Business Times has reached out to Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande for comments.
