If I was a celebrity, I feel like I'd be in constant fear that an overeager fan was about to lunge at me. But when an Ariana Grande fan crashed a concert stage, the 23-year-old singer couldn't have been more blasé about the whole thing, and it's honestly blowing my mind. She is currently just a few stops into her Dangerous Woman Tour, which she began on Feb. 3 in support of her 2016 album of the same name, and, at her Tuesday night show in Philadelphia, things didn't go exactly as planned. That's putting it mildly. As Grande sat in the middle of the stage singing "Moonlight," surrounded by smoke, you can see someone sneaking up behind her in the background. Oh, cool, so my nightmare; even just typing that sentence has me in goosebumps.
What you can't see from the video is how the man made it onstage in the first place, but he stands behind Grande for a while, edging awkwardly around as a security guard unsuccessfully grabs at his feet from the ground below. After lurking in the background for a second, the man moves forward and alongside Grande, and the girl does not miss a beat. All you have to do to get a surprised honk out of me is say my name when I'm not expecting it, but Grande is mid-ballad, alone on a stage, when she's interrupted by a strange man, and she doesn't move, doesn't flinch, doesn't even stop singing. She even waves at him. It's bananas.
Watch for yourself, and marvel at her level of calm.
It's only when the security guards finally get ahold of the guy that she stops her singing, but it's only to try to defuse the situation. She actually says the words "hey, chill out!," more interested in the safety of the person who crashed the stage than for herself. It's an unreal level of self-possession, and I can't get over it. It makes me nervous just watching the video, so I can't imagine experiencing it, can't imagine having a stranger unexpectedly mere feet away from me and not totally flipping out.
I guess that's why she's the celebrity, crooning her heart out onstage without missing a beat, while I'm a writer who peers out the windows of my home, wishing I didn't make plans on a Saturday night so I could stay home give my Netflix account mouth kisses.
