they met on broadway at fourteen and fifteen, were cast together on television two years later, and are still doing duets two decades on.
the short answer
they met in 2008 in the broadway cast of 13, where grande played charlotte and gillies played lucy, and were cast together two years later as cat valentine and jade west on victorious. grande has said she lived with gillies at her mother's house for a period. they have performed together repeatedly since, including their victorious duet give it up.
the broadway dressing room
13 opened in october 2008 with an entirely teenage cast. grande was fourteen and playing charlotte; gillies was fifteen and playing lucy. the piece on that show covers why it matters to the career generally. what it also produced is the longest continuous relationship in grande's professional life.
two years later they were cast on the same nickelodeon show, which is a coincidence only if you have never seen how small the pool of trained teenage musical performers is. by then they had already lived together — grande has said gillies stayed at her mother's house for a stretch.
cat and jade
on victorious they played opposites: cat sweet and scattered, jade caustic and deliberate. the show got a great deal of mileage out of the pairing, and give it up — their duet from it — is the single most durable piece of music either of them made there. it still gets performed.
the appearances since
- the thank u, next video (2018). gillies is in it, in the mean girls segment. so is most of grande's actual circle, which is part of why that video worked.
- livestreams and duets. the two have sung together informally more or less continuously, including covers well outside either of their catalogues.
- each other's premieres. gillies has been at grande's; grande has publicly backed gillies's return to the stage.
why it survived
gillies has given the least glamorous and most convincing explanation available: that they make a real effort to see each other. two people whose careers diverged completely — one into arenas, one into dynasty and stage work — staying close for eighteen years is a function of showing up rather than of shared industry.
it also sits oddly against the other well-known story from those years. the jennette mccurdy memoir describes a nickelodeon set as a place that pitted young performers against each other. this friendship is evidence that it did not do that uniformly, which is not a defence of the network so much as a note that the outcomes varied.
questions people ask
how did ariana grande and liz gillies meet?
in the broadway cast of 13 in 2008, when grande was fourteen and gillies fifteen. they were cast together on victorious two years later.
are ariana grande and elizabeth gillies still friends?
yes. they have performed together repeatedly since victorious ended and both talk about the friendship publicly.
what is give it up?
a duet the two performed as cat and jade on victorious. it has outlasted the show and they have sung it live together since, including on the 2019 tour.
is liz gillies in the thank u, next video?
yes, in the mean girls segment, alongside several other people from grande's real-life circle.
did they live together?
grande has said gillies stayed at her mother's house for a period during their teens.