Summary
Ariana Grande had been noticeably mum on the subject of the 2024 documentary seriesQuiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TVuntil she finally spoke out.Quiet on Setmade a huge splash when it aired on Max in March 2024, and exposed some secrets about the children’s television industry, specifically regarding Dan Schneider and the Nickelodeon TV shows he produced. There were manyshocking revelations in theQuiet on Setdocumentary, and the docuseries left a bad taste in the mouths of many Nickelodeon fans.
The documentary is primarily guided by reporters and culture writers, but some offormer Nickelodeon child stars appear inQuiet on Setto tell their sides of the story. Plenty of Nickelodeon actors don’t appear despite being mentioned, including Ariana Grande. Grande’s career has moved so far past a few short-lived sitcoms that it would be easy to forget she was even in them. Now a Grammy Award-winning singer and burgeoning movie star with a lead role in theWickedmovies, Grande did eventually comment on the documentary.
Dan Schneider & Amanda Bynes: Everything Revealed On Quiet On Set
Dan Schneider and Amanda Bynes don’t appear in Quiet on Set but their time at Nickelodeon is discussed amidst the toxic workplace allegations.
Ariana Grande Has Been “Reprocessing” Her Nickelodeon Experiences After Quiet On Set
Grande Has Complicated Feelings About Her Time On Those Nickelodeon Shows
On Nickelodeon, Ariana Grande was best known for her supporting role inVictoriousas Cat Valentine, a character which was spun off into her own show,Sam & Cat.Victoriousis particularly scrutinized in the documentary.Quiet on Setdetails a toxic workplaceand instances of child sexualization in these Schneider shows. The documentary shows clips of Grande having liquid poured on her and making strange gestures for what are supposed to be jokes but could be viewed as innuendos that are particularly inappropriate for children to do.
Grande sat down with Penn Badgley, who appeared in her “The Boy Is Mine” music video, on his podcast,Podcrushed, for his June 05, 2025, episode to discuss, among many other things, her thoughts onQuiet on Set. For one, Grande noted thatsome of the clips in the documentary were not approved by the network, and were instead uploaded to the show’s website,
“The things that weren’t approved for network were snuck onto our website or whatever. That is another discovery, but going into it, I guess I’m upset.”
She had not considered that anything she was doing was necessarily inappropriate at the time. According to Grande, she thought the pushing-the-envelope aspect was part of the point,
“I think it’s interesting because that way, speaking specifically about the show, was something that we were convinced was the cool thing about us. Like, that we push the envelope with our humor, the innuendos were like, we were told — convinced as well — that it was the cool differentiation.”
Part ofwhat made Grande and her coworkers feel okay about what they were doing was that the execs gave them positive feedback, Grande explained,
“There’s also a strange pattern that occurs where it’s really taken advantage of how much it means to the young performer to get a laugh from video village. You’re like, ‘Oh, s–t, I’m doing something great. This is funny. This is good.'”
However, looking back at all those sequences one after another made Grande realize there were issues,
“I don’t know, I think it just all happened so quickly and now looking back on some of the clips, I’m like, ‘Damn, like, really? Oh s–t.’ It’s like, if I had a daughter.”
Grande also recognizes that at the beginning of her time on the show,parents weren’t always on set, but towards the end, they came around more and more often,
“I think toward the end, my mom was allowed to come to set when I was little … When we were younger, they were allowed to come to run-throughs sometimes or things like that occasionally. But yeah, towards the end, she was there a little more.”
Even if a young Ariana Grande wasn’t completely aware of the problems on set, it appears that her parents and others understood something toxic was happening and made sure to be closer to production.
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Following Quiet On Set, Grande Is Advocating Mental Health Therapy For All Young Stars
Other Nickelodeon Actors Have Spoken Up About Quiet On Set
Ariana Grande ends her thoughts aboutQuiet on Setby suggesting that it is okay for child actors to work but that there needs to be safeguards for them, including mental health therapy, saying,
“There should be an element that is mandatory of therapy of a professional person to unpack what this experience of your life changing so drastically does to you at a young age, at any age.”
Grande is adamant about her appreciation for working on those shows but is coming to understand some things crossed the line. She’s also not the only one to come to such conclusions.Victoria Justice talked aboutQuiet on Set, saying that she did feel she was treated unfairly at times while on set.Allie DiMecospoke onTikTokabout the revelations inQuiet on Setand her experience onThe Naked Brothers Band:
“Because they made me kiss this 30 plus year old man when I was, what, 14? 15? I told them many times I didn’t want to do it, my mom was very against it, and they just pretty much made me feel like I was gonna lose my job and like, be fired if I didn’t do it. And it was weird.”
There are a lot of thoughts and feelings surroundingQuiet on Set, and it still may take time before the complete story is understood. The more that people with first-hand experience of the culture speak up about it, the more likely the truth will be uncovered.
