It’s one of the most touching songs in the film. Wicked: For Good just debuted a new song for Glinda (Ariana Grande), and it perfectly encapsulates the growth of her character.
The song got a sneak peek during the NBC special Wicked: One Wonderful Night, as well as Elphaba’s powerhouse “There’s No Place Like Home.” Cyntha Erivo says the song “captures the moment where Glinda decides not to just call herself good, but to truly become Glinda the Good.”
Related: The Real Reason Jonathan Bailey Wasn’t in Wicked: One Wonderful Night—Producers ‘Tried to Move Mountains’ For Him
What is the meaning behind “The Girl in the Bubble”?
“The Girl in the Bubble” is Glinda confronting her existential crisis and popping her bubble (figuratively and literally) to do what she thinks is good.
“We get to see [Glinda] decide, ‘I’m going to change the course of Oz. I’m going to become deeply, truly good and make a safe space for people,” Grande said. “She earns her title for real, and we get to see that self-discovery. I’m so grateful for that song, because she deserves it as a character.”
On the moment, director Jon M. Chu told Deadline, “I want to see her make this decision. I don’t just want to jump to it. I want to see her struggle. I want to be there with her when she wrestles with it. And then we were thinking about, okay, well this movie has a lot of reflections and distortions. We have a lot of that kind of symbolism and oh, what if she’s trapped in the image of herself? We never know what’s the reality, what’s not.”
Related: The 22 Best Wicked Fashion & Beauty Collaborations From Wet Brush, Target, Crocs, & More
Composer Stephen Schwartz told Rolling Stone India that it’s a major turning point for the character. “In this film, Glinda reaches a point of crisis where she just cannot continue to live the way she has been,” he said. “She has been insulated from what is really going on, cutting off her own morality and sense of decency in order to have the trappings of what she thinks she wants. Finally, there is a moment where she must confront this, and it felt essential that we take the time to have a song in which to do that.”
Wicked “The Girl in the Bubble” by Ariana Grande lyrics
Look, there’s that
Beautiful girl
With a beautiful life
Such a beautiful life
Built on lies
Cause all that’s required
To live in a dream
Is endlessly closing your eyes
She spins such beautiful stories
To sing her to sleep
Full of magic and glory and nerve
She’s the girl in the bubble
A bright shiny bubble
Blissfully floating above
Ah, but
The truth has a way
Of seeping on in
Beneath the surface and sheen
And blind as you’ve tried to be
Eventually
It’s hard to unsee what you’ve seen
And so that beautiful girl
With a beautiful life
Has a question that haunts her somehow
If she comes down from the sky
Gives the real world a try
Who in the world is she now?
And though so much of her wishes
That she could float on
And the beautiful lies never stop
For the girl in the bubble
The pink shiny bubble
It’s time for her bubble to pop
For the popular girl
High in the bubble
Isn’t it high time
For her bubble to pop
