Olivia Rodrigo reveals why she very nearly got arrested

Sounds terrifying!

Singer-songwriter Olivia Rodrigo during an interview with host Jimmy Fallon on Tuesday, October 29, 2024
(Image credit: Getty Images)

Olivia Rodrigo has admitted to almost getting in a LOT of trouble with the authorities.

The popstar just appeared on The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon, and told the host a story that sounds equal parts hilarious and scarring.

"So we were going from Canada to, like, Portland or something. We were at border control," Olivia explained to Jimmy.

She didn't think anything of it and gave the officer her passport, at which point they knocked on the car door and said: "We need Olivia." The "good 4 u" singer wasn't alarmed yet, because she thought maybe the police officer's daughter wanted an autograph or something.

"It's 3 a.m. and I'm delirious," she recalled. "They take me into a room, and it's an interrogation room. And there's like a big cop with like a gun, and he's like, 'Have you ever been arrested?' I'm like, 'No, I haven't been arrested.' He's like, 'Are you sure?' I'm like gaslighting myself, like, 'Oh my God, maybe I was, like, arrested and I didn't know it?'"

Jimmy understood exactly what Olivia was talking about, and seemed to express that he would have had the same reaction if it were him.

"He's like, 'You know, you could go to jail for lying to a federal officer like this, like this is really bad,'" Olivia continued. "I'm freaking out, I'm like, I'm not gonna be let into America, like I'm so scared, I'm like having a panic attack.

"After 30 minutes of interrogation, he looks at me and he goes, 'What's your name?' I go, 'Olivia Rodrigo.'"

She spelled her name out for him. "And he's like, 'Oh, there's a girl who looks just like you that's your same age that's been arrested multiple times, and her name's Olivia Rodriguez,'" the policeman eventually said.

"Jimmy, I was p*ssed!" Olivia told the talk show host, which, fair enough. But she conceded: "Crisis averted." Crisis averted indeed.

Iris Goldsztajn
Iris Goldsztajn is a celebrity and royal news writer for Marie Claire. As a London-based freelance journalist, she writes about wellness, relationships, pop culture, beauty and more for the likes of InStyle, Women's Health, Bustle, Stylist and Red. Aside from her quasi-personal investment in celebs' comings and goings, Iris is especially interested in debunking diet culture and destigmatising mental health struggles. Previously, she was the associate editor for Her Campus, where she oversaw the style and beauty news sections, as well as producing gift guides, personal essays and celebrity interviews. There, she worked remotely from Los Angeles, after returning from a three-month stint as an editorial intern for Cosmopolitan.com in New York. As an undergraduate at the University of California, Los Angeles, she interned at goop and C California Style and served as Her Campus' national style and LGBTQ+ editor. Iris was born and raised in France by a French father and an English mother. Her Spotify Wrapped is riddled with country music and One Direction, and she can typically be found eating her body weight in cheap chocolate.