MEAWW.COM / NEWS / CELEBRITY NEWS

Who is Frankie James Grande? Ariana Grande's half-brother welcomes her new fiancé Dalton Gomez into the family

'This is just the beginning of a long-lasting life filled with laughter & love. Ugh. I love you Ariana & Dalton! HAPPY ENGAGEMENT,' wrote Frankie on Ariana's engagement news

Ariana Grande stans, we have some good news. If you already haven’t seen the singer’s Instagram page, let us break the news to you: she is engaged. Yes, Ariana got engaged to Dalton Gomez on Sunday, December 20. She announced the news through a series of photos on social media. In one, Ariana can be seen flashing a big rock on her ring finger. She captioned the post, “forever n then some.”

According to ET online, the proposal comes nine months after the two started dating. Gomez is a luxury real estate agent. While her fans are super excited for her, the artiste’s family also joined in congratulating her for the engagement. Ariana’s half-brother Frankie James Grande tweeted, “I am so happy for my sister and so excited to (officially) welcome Dalton into the family! YAY! This is just the beginning of a long-lasting life filled with laughter & love. Ugh. I love you Ariana & Dalton! HAPPY ENGAGEMENT.”

Who is Frankie James Grande?

Ariana and Frankie have a mother in common, Joan Grande. He was born in New York and grew up in Englewood and Boca Raton.  According to a 2014 The New York Times article, as a child, he was fascinated with Harry Potter and science fiction, but he also was interested in theater and his mother took him to Manhattan to see shows. In fifth grade, he auditioned to play Conrad Birdie in the school production of ‘Bye Bye Birdie’ by singing ‘Wind Beneath My Wings’. He got the part.

Frankie graduated from Muhlenberg College in Allentown. He majored in biology, theater and dance. Later, he appeared in the national Equity tour of ‘Dora the Explorer’ and, in 2007, he picked up an understudy role in Broadway’s ‘Mamma Mia!’ and was associated with the show till 2010.

He also was involved with producing theater. Frankie collaborated with Philip Morgaman, a friend from middle school, and the two persuaded money out of former classmates who had become investment bankers. Their first joint production, ‘Hamlet’, in 2009 starring Jude Law was a commercial hit. But their next two plays, ‘La Bête’ and ‘Born Yesterday’, were not successful.

“In a short time, I went through the entire gamut of what a producer goes through,” Frankie told NYT. In 2012, Frankie started his own YouTube channel. Currently, the channel has about 459K followers.

He has starred in the long-running musical ‘Rock of Ages’. Frankie was also a contestant on Season 16 of the CBS reality show ‘Big Brother’. The openly gay big brother of Ariana is extremely close to his half-sibling. Speaking about Ariana, he said, “We are yin and yang. Ariana’s the businesswoman, and I’m the clown. We admire each other and draw on each other. I’ll say, ‘I don’t know what to do.’ She’ll say, ‘Center your mind’. She’ll say, ‘What should I do?’ I’ll say, ‘Smile, do a cartwheel, and laugh’.”

Not just Frankie, even their mother Joan expressed her happiness on Twitter. Mother Grande tweeted, “I am so excited to welcome Dalton Gomez into our family!  Ariana, I love you and Dalton so much!!!! Here’s to happily ever after! YAY! Xoxoxo.”