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Jennette McCurdy Claims Nickelodeon Didn’t Give Her Equal Opportunities as Costar Ariana Grande
Speaking her truth. Former iCarly star Jennette McCurdy opened up about her experience working for Nickelodeon and alleged that her former costar Ariana Grande received better treatment with career opportunities.
“What finally undid me was when Ariana came whistle-toning in with excitement because she had spent the previous evening playing charades at Tom Hanks’ house,” the Los Angeles native, 30, claimed in an excerpt of her upcoming book I’m Glad My Mom Died — shared by The New York Times — which will become available on Tuesday, August 9. “That was the moment I broke.”
In this section of her memoir, Jennette was alleging that the Paramount network subsidiary limited her from other ventures in the entertainment business when she starred alongside the “God Is a Woman” artist, 29, in their spinoff series, Sam & Cat.
The True Jackson VP alum also alleged that Nickelodeon had offered her $300,000 as long as she did not publicly discuss her time at the network. However, Jennette claimed that she rejected the deal.
Despite her apparent negative experience with the hit kids’ channel, Jennette discussed the possibility of returning to acting in a separate portion in her book.
“I have people around me now that are so supportive and so loving,” she wrote. “It makes me tearful with joy. I feel so safe. I feel so much trust and so much openness.”
Shortly after Sam & Cat ended in 2014, Jennette went on to land more film and television roles in various shows, including Netflix’s Between. She then quit the industry, noting that she “initially didn’t want to do it” in a previous episode of her podcast, “Empty Inside,” that was released in March 2021.
“I’m so ashamed of the parts I’ve done in the past,” the “So Close” singer admitted at the time. “I resent my career in a lot of ways. I feel so unfulfilled by the roles that I played and felt like it was the most cheesy, embarrassing [thing]. … I did the shows that I was on from like 13 to 21, and by 15, I was already embarrassed. My friends at 15 weren’t like ‘Oh, cool, you’re on this Nickelodeon show.’ It was embarrassing. I imagine there’s a very different experience to be had with acting if you’re proud of your roles.”
Jennette’s disinterest in starring in any more Nickelodeon projects made headlines after the iCarly 2021 reboot was released, which includes her former costars, Miranda Cosgrove, Nathan Kress and Jerry Trainor.
Nathan, 29, addressed Jennette’s choice not to reprise her role as Sam Puckett in an episode of his podcast, “Radioactive Dads.”
“I think it’s just a personal decision and where she’s at and what she wants to do,” he said in February 2021. “I think her focus has generally been on content creation, doing like her podcast that’s doing really well and writing, directing, producing. It seems like that’s just where her focus is. And I think — this is speculating too — but because she already did a spin-off series doing Sam & Cat, she might also feel like she got 60, 70 more episodes than we did as our characters, and maybe she just feels like her character is complete.”
Nickelodeon did not immediately respond to In Touch’s request for comment.
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