Wicked's Ethan Slater reveals how he coped with intense trolling following his casting

8 November 2024, 13:37 | Updated: 18 November 2024, 21:35

By Katie Louise Smith

Ethan has faced judgement from millions of people on social media over his relationship with his co-star Ariana Grande.

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Wicked star Ethan Slater has opened up about how he copes with his newfound fame and the intense scrutiny he's faced over the past year or so following his casting in the upcoming movie musical and his relationship with Ariana Grande.

Before he was cast as Boq in Jon M. Chu's Wicked, Ethan was treading the boards on Broadway. In 2018, he was nominated for a Tony for playing SpongeBob in SpongeBob SquarePants: The Broadway Musical. He also recently just completed a run in Spamalot.

In 2023 while filming Wicked, he began a relationship with co-star Ariana and the attention surrounding them increased massively. It sadly wasn't all positive either.

Now, in an interview with GQ Hype, Ethan has opened up about all the attention and what he does to combat the negativity.

Read more: Wicked movie hailed as a "masterpiece" in early critics reviews
Read more: Ariana Grande responds to criticism of her playing Glinda in Wicked

Ethan Slater and Ariana Grande have faced millions of negative comments since they started dating in 2023. Picture: @michelleyeoh_official via Instagram

In the profile, Ethan is asked briefly if he's found an outlet for the new "jagged attention" he found himself at the centre of.

Opening up about the whole thing, he said: "I do a lot of writing. It’s obviously a different kind of writing. I do songwriting—that’s mostly for me, that’s my hobby at this point. And Marshall [Paliet, his creative partner and close friend] and I write a lot together. I write a lot on my own, and I think that has been my outlet in a lot of ways.”

"I’ve got an amazing support system of family and friends who I talk to and confide in," he continued, adding that it's something he's thankful for “in an industry that can be a little tough, that I’m just starting to get a taste of both sides of.”

“But also, again,” he added, “some of the hard parts that you’re talking about are the personal-life stuff that everybody in the world goes through. And so I am really focused on the real people in my life, who those things affect, and doing right by every real person and not the Twitter people who comment on it."

Watch the trailer for Wicked

Later in the profile, he also directly addressed the hurtful comments and false speculation about his relationship with Ariana.

"I think there was something that was really difficult about things in your private life being commented on and looked at by the public," he added. "There were a lot of big changes in private lives that were really happening, so it’s really hard to see people who don’t know anything about what’s happening commenting on it and speculating, and then getting things wrong about the people you love."

"So just to address that part of it, that feels really hard," he continued, before sharing: "It was an amazing year and a really beautiful thing, and I’m just really excited. I’m just really, really proud of Ari and the work she’s done on this. She’s poured herself into it. I’m really proud that I got to be there for that part of it, and I’m really excited to be there for this next step of it when the world gets to see the amazing thing that she did.”

Ethan Slater joins the Wicked cast at the Australian premiere. Picture: Getty

Earlier this year, Wicked fans stepped in to defend Ethan after a poster of him as Boq was flooded with negative sentiments on Instagram.

The comments got so bad that the official Wicked Instagram account temporarily disabled them from being posted.

Reacting, one fan wrote: "The official Wicked movie account has disabled comments on Ethan Slater’s character poster. Please, leave this man alone. Regardless of the situation, which none of us know the truth about, he does not deserve endless hate and harassment. Treat others how you wish to be treated."