Ben Stiller Says Ariana Grande's Role in ‘Meet the Parents 4' Is ‘the Whole Engine' of Film
Ben Stiller has officially confirmed what pretty much everyone has known: Ariana Grande will indeed be part of the fourth installment of the Meet the Parents franchise next year.
'I can't really talk too much, I guess, at this point about the movie,' Stiller told The Today Show during a 25th anniversary reunion of the cast of the first film. 'But the character she's playing is — she's going to be really, really funny and kind of the whole engine of the new movie. So it's exciting.'
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'Half the things — the scenes that I have with her will be singing scenes,' co-star Robert De Niro joked on The Today Show.
In May, Grande, coming off a Best Actress Oscar nomination for Wicked, let the news out when she posted on social media: 'Very thrilled to be joining (meeting) the family !!!!!!!' The same month, the Hollywood Reporter divulged that Grande's character will likely be a 'ball-busting woman' engaged to the son of the couple played by Stiller and Teri Polo. Along with De Niro and Blythe Danner, Polo will be returning to the new film.
The next Meet the Parents, the first addition to the franchise in 15 years, will continue to follow the foibles of Stiller's character Greg Focker and his wife Pam (Polo), their parents, and now their children. The original film was followed by Meet the Parents, which featured Barbara Streisand and Dustin Hoffman, and 2010's Little Fockers. The latest installment will be directed by John Hamburg, who has had a hand in the screenplay of all four films.
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