The 'Sam & Cat' actress spoke to ET about her relationship with Grande, her memoir and more.
While Jennette McCurdy's relationship with her Sam & Cat co-star, Ariana Grande, may be strained, she's still hoping the 29-year-old musician reads her memoir, I'm Glad My Mom Died.
"I don’t know if she'll read the book or not," McCurdy told ET's Rachel Smith, "but I think it’s a really entertaining read regardless of who you are, so I hope she does."
In the memoir, out Tuesday, McCurdy recalled feeling jealous of Grande as she missed work in pursuit of her burgeoning singing career.
"The week where I was told Ariana would not be here at all, and that they would write around her absence this episode by having her character be locked in a box. Are you. Kidding me," McCurdy wrote in her memoir. "So I have to turn down movies while Ariana’s off whistle-toning at the Billboard Music Awards? F**k. This."
The situation led McCurdy to "resent being a good sport," something she was often praised for.
"If I wasn’t such a good sport to begin with, I wouldn’t be in this predicament in the first place. I wouldn’t be on this sh**ty show saying these sh**ty lines on this sh**ty set with this sh**ty hairstyle," she said. "Maybe my life would be entirely different right now. I fantasize about it being different. But it’s not different. It’s this. This is what it is. Ariana misses work in pursuit of her music career while I act with a box. I’m pissed about it. And I’m pissed at her. Jealous of her.
A final breaking point came after "Ariana came whistle-toning in with excitement because she had spent the previous evening playing charades at Tom Hanks’s house."
"That was the moment I broke," McCurdy recalled. "I couldn’t take it anymore. Music performances and magazine covers... whatever, I’ll get over it. But playing a family game at National Treasure, two-time Academy Award–winner and six-time nominee Tom Hanks’s house? I’m done."
She even went as far as to say she didn't like the "7 Rings" singer, writing "I couldn't like her."
"Pop star success I could handle, but hanging out with Sheriff Woody, with Forrest F**king Gump? This has gone too far," she said. "So now, every time she misses work, it feels like a personal attack. Every time something exciting happens to her, I feel like she robbed me of having that experience myself."
While the Sam & Cat experience was rocky for the 30-year-old actress, it hasn't totally put her off acting. Though she's been focusing on writing and directing, McCurdy told ET she's considering stepping back in front of the camera, too.
"I am shocked to be saying -- have you ever had one of those thoughts where it’s like, 'Oh where did that come from? Why is this happening?," she began. "I had that maybe, I wanna say, a couple months back where I thought, 'You know what? There might be a way for me to act from a place that feels really healing and empowered, maybe write something for myself.'"
McCurdy continued, "I don't know what that looks like. I haven’t gone that far, definitely wanna focus on writing and directing, but I'm open to the idea of acting, which feels like growth to me because I had walked away from it so definitively in my past, which felt important to me at the time. But I'm just in a different place now."
I'm Glad My Mom Died is out now.
RELATED CONTENT
