When Victorious premiered on Nickelodeon in 2010, young audiences got their first glimpse of a then-unknown Grande playing Cat Valentine. For four seasons, she starred alongside Victoria justice and portrayed an aspiring artist attending Hollywood Arts High School until the show ended in 2013.
A year later, TMZ unearthed the budding starlet’s first-ever entertainment contract and discovered that Miss Ari had been raking in serious money since her early teens. As the documents revealed, a 16-year-old Grande was making $9,000 per episode, and that’s just in the first season, which had 19 episodes. That’s $171,000 right there.
What’s more, TMZ learned that she was also getting paid extra for writing various tracks for the series, including $4,000 for its theme song, $3,000 for another piece that appeared in multiple episodes, and $1,500 for a 20-second piece. What’s more, while on Victorious, she also snagged a music contract that promised to pay her $50,000 for her debut album with the option of recording four more after that with increasing rates.
