Ariana Grande’s Netflix film Excuse Me, I Love You is part concert movie, part tour documentary, as director Paul Dugdale’s cameras followed the singer to capture select behind-the-scenes moments while on her 2019 Sweetener tour. But in some ways, it’s also a family dramedy. What it lacks in melodrama, it makes up for in sweet moments of Ari just vibing and laughing with her best friends and creative collaborators — her chosen family. In that sense, Excuse Me, I Love You is as much a love letter to them as it is one to her fans.
It’s a small glimpse into the singer’s world, featuring glittery performances, conversations over politics and lash glue, and moments of pure, unfiltered randomness. For Ariana, the Sweetener tour was a period of catharsis, the light that was promised after a difficult year following so much personal tragedy for the singer. For viewers, the celebratory mood of Excuse Me, I Love You offers a similar release through the power of pop music and dancing through the pain of everyday life. “This show for sure saved my life this year,” she says through tears near the end of the film. And maybe it will bring comfort to yours.
If the “Positions” singer seems uninterested in rehashing old trauma, that’s because she is. As you can see in the film, she’s busy replenishing her spirit with showtunes and horror movies. Here’s what else we learned while watching Excuse Me, I Love You:
1. Ari loves her crew
The focus of Excuse Me, I Love You is less on Ariana and more on the people around her, and if you’re already a stan, then their names and faces will be familiar to you — The Twins, Fredo, Aaron, Josh, Victoria Monét, and Joan (who is introduced with the title card “need we say more?”) — but watching Ari interact with everyone in her crew, from her dancers (who all get to shine in the film) to her lighting techs (the “incredible” Phillip Comer is lowkey the MVP) to the staff she waves to while wandering the halls of these arena-sized labyrinths, it’s clear that the singer wanted to highlight all of the people who made the Sweetener World Tour so successful — and so healing for her.
2. The Twins are real stars
Throughout the film, we meet Ari’s close inner circle of friends, collaborators, and creatives. By her side the entire time, on stage and off, are Brian and Scott Nicholson, lovingly referred to as “The Twins,” and they’re Ariana’s dancers, choreographers, and close friends. (Brian also worked as a creator director for the Sweetener World Tour, helping Ari’s vision come to life, while Scott is credited as a songwriter — his most famous contribution to the singer’s discography is the lyric “just gimme them babies” in “34+35,” which Ariana called the “best night of [her] life.”)
Full-time dancers and part-time stage moms, Brian and Scott have worked with Ariana since the beginning of her career. They’re undoubtedly an instrumental part of her chosen family, and Excuse Me, I Love You puts them at center stage. “The atmosphere Ariana creates when she’s working is always open, creative, and super inspiring,” Scott said in a statement to Genius. That openness, collaboration, and celebration is reflected in the film, through the way Ari asks Scott to help her film a video for Mariah Carey (yes, that happened), how they make the mood lighter when she’s near tears before her last show, and how they move so fluidly on stage together.
3. Ariana is a supportive best friend
Victoria Monet (L) and Ariana Grande perform onstage during Ariana Grande Sweetener World Tour at Staples Center on May 07, 2019 in Los Angeles, California.
During rehearsals for her stop in Anaheim, California, Ariana adds “Monopoly” to her setlist so that she can perform it with her best friend and songwriter Victoria Monét. To accommodate the surprise performance, she says she’ll cut “Successful” from the setlist. In an industry that loves to pit women against each other, to imply that there’s only room for one woman at the top, watching Ari support her best friend and her career by sharing the stage — using her platform and influence to lift others up — is a powerful kiss-off. “Outta here with that f*ckery,” they sing.
4. She loves watching horror movies on tour
Or maybe she just loves forcing Scott to watch them. While on a flight to their next tour stop, Ariana, Brian, and Scott watch Ari Aster’s Midsommar. Ari’s laughing through the psychological folk horror, while Scott looks absolutely terrified. “Tour pastimes: forcing Scott to watch horror movies he will never recover from,” the singer annotates on screen. (They watch it a second time on a larger screen so that Ari can explain the plot.)
5. She FaceTimes with Broadway legend Kristin Chenoweth
Okay, so it’s not that surprising that Ari and Cheno are good friends. Their friendship was forged by their mutual love of musical theater — a young Ariana met Kristin, her Broadway idol, after a performance of Wicked — and they even got to share the same stage thanks to Hairspray Live! So when Ariana shared that she had been on a FaceTime call with the performer in Excuse Me, I Love You, nothing about the story seemed especially revelatory. Until she mentioned what was happening during the call.
We won’t go into graphic detail, but it involves her dog Myron’s explosive diarrhea, Piggy’s poop, Ari’s tears, and her photographer/best friend Alfredo Flores’s queasy stomach. And yes, Cheno was on the call during the whole 15-minute ordeal. That’s true friendship.
6. She’s still a theater girl at heart
While in the car with her friend Aaron Simon Gross, Ari and Simon break out into a lovely, impromptu rendition of “Astonishing” from the Little Women musical. Watching Ariana sing the lyric “Who is he with his marry me? With his ring and his marry me?” just hits different after her engagement to Dalton Gomez.
7. Ariana buys her own bootleg merch
Photo: Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for Ariana Grande
“Should we buy the bootleg merch this time?” Ariana asks Simon while on the way to the Forum LA for her next show. There’s something deeply relatable about knowing one of the biggest pop stars on the planet is not immune to the tawdry draw of bootleg t-shirts with her face on them. Sadly, Ari forgot to bring cash. (Again, a relatable queen!)
8. Her makeup removal secret is… coconut oil
Coconut oil has long been touted as a “miracle” elixir for skin and hair because of its natural antibacterial and moisturizing properties, but the “Positions” singer reveals she uses it as a cleansing oil to remove her makeup, especially those pesky face gems that Ari jokes she’ll have to take with her to the grave because of the strong adhesive.
“You should see me bleeding and crying with my coconut oil,” she playfully whines before heading on stage. Where’s the skin-care routine video, Ari?
9. Mariah Carey knows who Ariana is — and she likes her a lot
One of the most surprisingly emotional moments of the film happens when Ariana learns that Mariah Carey, Queen of Christmas, has asked her to be part of a star-studded music video for “All I Want For Christmas Is You.” Ari smiles and asks her manager Scooter Braun, “Does that mean she likes me?” Scooter replies, “She actually likes you a lot.” (Remember that just a few years ago Mariah said she didn’t even know her, so this is what we call character development.)
In this scene, we see Ariana Grande as she really is: a young woman who deeply loves music and the women vocalists who inspired her career. She’s sincere and shy when talking about how she learned to sing and perfect her vocal runs by mimicking her favorite divas: Beyonce, Whitney, and Mariah. “The fact that she thought of me is very soul-shaking,” Ari says of the request. “I hope she likes it.”
10. Ariana was living for Trump’s impeachment
If you’ve ever wondered how quickly news travels on tour, then Excuse Me, I Love You has a scene for you. Mid-rehearsal, Ariana is told that President Trump had been impeached by the House of Representatives. She gasps, screams into the microphone to tell her crew the news, and then dramatically falls to the floor, before picking herself up and celebrating with her dancers. As they jump around the stage, a title card written by Ariana appears. It reads, “Too bad he wasn’t convicted — thank god Biden won anyway!”
Later, Ariana and her stylists have a conversation about Trump’s impeachment backstage before the show. There’s dozens of people buzzing around, getting things in order, while Ari’s “hair extraordinaire” Josh Liu calmly explains how now the case needs to pass through the Republican-controlled Senate. It’s a rare moment of seriousness amidst all of the spectacle and chaos of putting on a world tour. Ariana nods her head knowingly and says, “One step’s better than nothing.”
The film’s final image is of Ariana performing “No Tears Left to Cry,” the tour’s closing number. The scene is colorful and celebratory, as she and her dancers run around the stage waving pride flags and twirling in confetti. It’s also a moment of catharsis — a blissed-out state of mind we want to be in, like, all the time.
