Dean Wendt has been the voice of Barney since 2002, and on Friday morning he answered two of his old costars. In a TikTok video, Wendt watches Selena Gomez and Demi Lovato in “Life in Selfies,” a separate video posted Thursday in which the two flip through photos from across their lives. When they land on a picture from the Barney & Friends set, Gomez brings up a habit from their days on the show: the two of them used to tap their microphones and whisper to each other while they worked.
Wendt was listening then, and he says so now. “I used to hear that in my booth,” he says in the video, adding, “I used to listen to everything they said too.” In the caption, he writes that he “used to hear everything you two were whispering and giggling about between takes.” He signs off the way Barney always did: “I love both of them. They are amazing. And I’m so glad they’re back together. And remember, I love you.”
It was Wendt’s second message to them this week. On Wednesday, he stitched their Rare Beauty reunion vlog to tease them about the state of the room behind them: “Hey, obviously you didn’t learn clean up, clean up. Look at that room.” Then he turned sincere: “No, honestly, I’m glad to see you guys back together.”
The friendship he is cheering on started in an audition line. As Gomez has told it, roughly 1,400 children lined up in Texas in 2002 to try out for Barney & Friends, and the girl standing in front of her, wearing a red bow, was Demi Lovato. Both girls were picked. Gomez played Gianna and Lovato played Angela in seasons seven and eight, from 2002 to 2004. Wendt had become Barney’s voice that same year, succeeding the show’s original voice, Bob West, so for the girls’ entire run on the series, his was the voice they heard on set.
The moment arrives at the end of a reunion week for the pair. On Wednesday, Gomez and Lovato released their “Checking In” vlog for Rare Beauty, their first joint vlog in 18 years. Thursday’s photo video was something separate, two friends looking back, and it was the Barney photo in that video that reached all the way back to the recording booth.
As the photos roll on, Wendt settles in to keep watching: “I’m going to watch more of this.” Twenty-four years after two seven-year-olds met in that audition line, the man in the booth is still listening.