Of Truth and Fame

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Ariana Grande-Butera (born June 26, 1993 in Boca Raton, Florida)  is an American singer, songwriter and actress. Born in Florida to a family of Italian origin, she began her career in 2008 in the Broadway musical 13, before playing the role of Cat Valentine in the Nickelodeontelevision series Victorious and in the spinoff Sam & Cat  . She has also appeared in other theatre and television roles and has lent her voice to animated television and films.

Grande's music career began in 2011 with the soundtrack Music from Victorious. Since then, Grande has earned three number-one albums on the US Billboard 200 with Yours Truly (2013), My Everything (2014), and Sweetener (2018). She has also attained a number-two album with Dangerous Woman (2016). Her upcoming fifth studio album will be titled Thank U, Next. Furthermore, Grande has earned six top-five singles on the US Billboard Hot 100, including "Problem", "Break Free", "Bang Bang", "Side to Side", "No Tears Left to Cry", and the chart-topping "Thank U, Next".  Grande is the first artist in the history of the chart to have the lead singles from each of their first four albums debut within the top-ten, and in 2014, she continuously charted inside the top-ten for 34 weeks and had the most top 10 singles of any artist that year. She has completed two arena tours: The Honeymoon Tour in 2015 and Dangerous Woman Tour in 2017.

Her accolades include three American Music Awards, three MTV Europe Music Awards, two MTV Video Music Awards and six Grammy Award nominations. She has supported a range of charities and has a large following on social media. In 2016, Time named Grande one of the 100 most influential people in the world on their annual list. In 2018, Billboard named her Woman of the Year.

Early Life and Her Start for Singing:      was and always an actor!

Ariana Grande-Butera was born on June 26, 1993, in Boca Raton, Florida.  She is the daughter of Joan Grande, the Brooklyn-born CEO of Hose-McCann Communications, a manufacturer of communications and safety equipment,  and Edward Butera, a graphic design firm owner in Boca Raton. Grande is of Italian descent,  and she refers to herself as an Italian American "half Sicilian and half Abruzzese".  Her name was inspired by Princess Oriana from Felix the Cat: The Movie. She has an older half-brother, Frankie Grande, an entertainer and producer, and she has a close relationship with her maternal grandmother, Marjorie Grande. Grande's family moved from New York to Florida when her mother was pregnant with her, and her parents separated when she was around 8 or 9 years old.

As a child, Grande performed with the Fort Lauderdale Children's Theater, playing her first role as the title character in Annie. She also performed in the musicals The Wizard of Oz and Beauty and the Beast.  At the age of 8, she performed at a karaoke lounge on a cruise ship and with various orchestras such as South Florida's Philharmonic, Florida Sunshine Pops and Symphonic Orchestras, and she made her first national television appearance singing "The Star-Spangled Banner" for the Florida Panthers. She attended Pine Crest School and North Broward Preparatory School.

By age 13, she became serious about pursuing a music career, though she still concentrated on theater.  When she first arrived in Los Angeles to meet with her managers, she expressed a desire to record an R&B album: "I was like, 'I want to make an R&B album,' They were like 'Um, that's a helluva goal! Who is going to buy a 14-year-old's R&B album?!'" In 2008, Grande was cast in the supporting role of cheerleader Charlotte in the musical 13 on Broadway, for which she won a National Youth Theatre Association Award.  When she joined the musical, Grande left North Broward Preparatory School, but continued to be enrolled; the school sent materials to her so she could study with tutors.  She also sang various times at the New York City jazz club Birdland.

2009–2012: Breakthrough on Nickelodeon

Grande was cast in the Nickelodeon television show Victorious along with 13 co-star Elizabeth Gillies in 2009. In this sitcom, set in a performing arts high school, Grande played the "adorably dimwitted" Cat Valentine.  She had to dye her hair red every other week for the role because the executive producer, Dan Schneider, did not want all the cast members to be brunettes, and the red hair was also a feature that the network felt would fit the personality of Cat. The show premiered in March 2010 to the second largest audience for a live-action series in Nickelodeon history with 5.7 million viewers.  The role helped propel Grande to teen idol status, but she was more interested in a music career, stating that acting is "fun, but music has always been first and foremost with me." Her character was compared to "Brittany Murphy's performance as the hapless Tai in Clueless" (1995) and described as being "very impressionable and easily swayed" but "generally sweet".  The second season premiered in April 2011 to 6.2 million viewers, becoming the highest rated episode of Victorious. In 2010, she played the role of Miriam in the musical Cuba Libre, written and produced by songwriter Desmond Child.