9-Year-Old “Wicked” Fan Goes Viral for Singing Along to Movie. After 1 of the Stars Took Notice, His Whole Life Changed (Exclusive)

NEED TO KNOW

• Eric Wiltz, a 9-year-old from Houston, went viral in September for a video singing “The Wizard and I” from Wicked

• The clip caught the attention of Cynthia Erivo and Universal Pictures, who invited him to the New York City premiere of Wicked: For Good later this month

• The young star chats with PEOPLE about his love of music, the upcoming Wicked premiere and what’s next for him

When asked how long he’s been singing, 9-year-old Eric Wiltz responds confidently: “Since I was 1.”

His mom Cherisse, who sits next to her son as they chat with PEOPLE over Zoom, can confirm.

“It’s been literally since he could talk,” she says. “A lot of babies start cooing and doing the ‘goo goos’ and ‘ga gas’ — but some of the first things Eric were doing was humming. And when he learned to talk, it was over.”

By the time he was 2, Eric’s grandma had realized that he could actually hum the pitches of notes he was hearing. Now he’s old enough to binge-watch music videos, and when it’s time to put away the electronics, Eric hums and sings to fill the silence.

“Sometimes I sing myself to sleep,” he tells PEOPLE. “I always loved anything with music because it gives me this feeling like I can’t hold my body back — that I need to dance and sing.”

Naturally, when he saw the blockbuster adaptation of Wicked at his friend’s birthday party, it was a pretty pivotal moment. When he and his mom got home, they started streaming the movie-musical as frequently as they possibly could.

“We’ve watched it, like, 10 times,” says Eric.

“Way more than 10,” Cherisse quickly admits.

“15? 20? 25?” Eric continues.

“I’m not going to lie to you,” says Cherisse. “There’s been some days where it has run three times in a row. It’s like comfort music in the background — we just let it play.”

And Eric was studying: learning the lyrics, the melodies, even the precise inflections of Cynthia Erivo’s voice.

One day in September, Eric had come home from the bus stop in a sour mood, and his mom suggested they turn on Wicked to lighten his spirits. He was standing at the foot of her bed — eyes glued to the screen, belting out a pitch-perfect rendition of “The Wizard and I” as the movie played — when Cherisse had the idea to video her son.

“I normally don’t record my kids just in their element,” she says. “But something in me was like, ‘You should record.’ ”

On a whim, she uploaded the video to TikTok, not expecting much to come of it. The post now has over 5 million views, and the comments are even more impressive: Erivo, herself, wrote in to Eric, telling him she “can’t wait” to see him perform on a stage or screen one day.

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Cherisse captured her son’s reaction when he learned about that message from Erivo: His grin is enormously wide as he asks his mom if it’s a prank. “I didn’t know that could happen to me,” he says in a clip she uploaded to TikTok. “I was not expecting to cry today.”

And that was only the beginning of their whirlwind month. Several days later, an agent reached out to sign Eric, and even though he had never taken an acting or singing lesson in his life, he started filming audition tapes for an upcoming movie.

Celebrity comments — from Hamilton’s Leslie Odom Jr. and Black Panther’s Letitia Wright — kept rolling in, alongside thousands of followers eager to watch Eric’s inevitable journey in show business. Eric officially booked the movie part and jetted off to the set to start filming. And maybe most exciting of all, he received an invite from Universal Pictures to attend the New York City premiere of Wicked: For Good in November.

“I ran upstairs and started bouncing myself on my bed,” recalls Eric. “I thought it wasn’t real. I thought I was dreaming. I was trying to wake myself up — smashing pillows across my face.”

Even though the initial shock has now worn off, he can’t stop thinking about the premiere.

Eric’s already started mulling over his outfit options (“I want it to be 2025, but also classy,” he says, which probably means a suit and maybe some green sparkly shoes). He has plenty of theories about the color of the carpet (“I’ve seen all of the premieres,” he notes, and by his calculations, this year’s will be pink). And he’s anticipating the moment he finally meets Erivo and Ariana Grande in person.

“If I can talk to them, I will pass out. I won’t even be able to get my words out,” he says. “I don’t care how dirty the floor is.”

While Eric doesn’t yet have his own social media accounts — his mom is posting him on her own page for now, since he’s only 9 — he already has thousands of fans online who were thrilled to find out he had gotten the premiere invite, cheering him on in the comments.

“Social media can be a nasty place, but for us, it’s become such a wonderful place,” says Cherisse. “I’m personally, as his mother, very grateful because it can go one of two ways, and it went good. That’s my kid, and I couldn’t ask for anything less than simple kindness for my child.”

Says Eric: “They encourage me to keep going.”

Just over a month since Eric’s video first went viral, he and his mom are still pinching themselves. They’re also eternally grateful for all of the opportunities they’ve gotten so far.

“If the Wicked premiere is where it stops, we are thankful and it’s been a heck of a journey,” says Cherisse.

“My agents told me that this is not always going to happen — that I’m not always going to get the role to the part I want,” adds Eric. “I’ll be fine with that because at least I will get to experience trying to get the role. I’m thankful that we’ve come this far.”

But, adds Eric at the end of the Zoom call, if his viral moment does mark the beginning of a lucrative career in Hollywood, he has promised his mom he will buy her a pink Barbie Dreamhouse with the money.

Read the original article on People