The boy is theirs! As fans across generations delight in Ariana Grande‘s new “The Boy Is Mine” remix with Brandy and Monica, the Grammy-winning “So Gone” star is opening up about how the star-studded collaboration sparked true healing for her and Brandy.
“The process of the new collaboration did a lot of closing the gaps,” Monica told Entertainment Tonight. “When you properly communicate, something — you can find not only the resolutions and solutions to problems — but sometimes you find that there weren’t ever problems, just consistent miscommunications.”
Brandy and Monica teamed up for the original “The Boy Is Mine” back in 1998, spending 13 weeks atop the Billboard Hot 100 and winning a Grammy together in the process. During the song’s reign and in the years that followed, the two R&B icons were long-rumored to be beefing, with their rocky relationship becoming a key part of the song’s lore. Now, more than 25 years after “The Boy Is Mine” first entered the contemporary American pop canon, the two singers have found a way to move forward and preserve their friendship.
“We recognized that the key was to keep other people out of our relationship, both business and personal, and let it be between she and I, and that has changed everything. It’s changed the trajectory of it in its totality,” the “Angel of Mine” singer said. “My son was in the hospital the other day and she was who I was speaking to while he was there, so I think that is what Ariana has done that she may not even realize.”
Grande originally released “The Boy Is Mine” from her Billboard 200-topping Eternal Sunshine LP earlier this year, with the track instantly becoming a fan-favorite. Upon the album’s debut, “The Boy Is Mine” entered the Hot 100 at No. 16. This week (chart dated June 22), the song re-entered the Hot 100 at No. 64, following the release of its Catwoman-inspired Penn Badgley-starring music video. The cinematic clip also featured cameos from Brandy and Monica, giving fans a little Easter egg for the new remix. Grande’s track is inspired by Brandy and Monica’s original duet — which Billboard named the greatest karaoke duet of all time — but the remix does interpolate elements from the hook of the 1998 chart-topper.
“I’ve always said that the song should not be touched, right? And I said that because I felt that it did not need to be redone in the idea of, let’s say, actually doing it the exact way that it was,” Monica explained. “But Ariana and [producer] Max Martin — as soon as I heard this version, I fell in love with it.”
According to Monica — who recently headlined the inaugural Blavity House Party in Nashville — Grande sent her flowers and a note. The “We Can’t Be Friends” singer also hopped on FaceTime with Monica, Brandy and their respective families. “What I am so amazed by is her humility, her compassion,” Monica gushed. “Everything has been directly from her chest and, for me, authenticity, humility, all of those things are key.”
The new remix marks the Grande’s second re-imagining of an Eternal Sunshine track. Earlier this year, the Grammy-winner linked up with Mariah Carey for a new version of her house-steeped Hot 100 chart-topper “Yes, And?”