I have a weird appreciation for Tyler Perry. He’s one of the few mainstream directors actually working to make films for African American audiences, but he also makes nothing but those horrible Madea movies. Or he makes a movie starring Kim Kardashian about how any woman who wants more than to be subservient to her man will get AIDS and it’ll be her fault. It’s one step forward, two steps back kinda thing, although The Boondocks episode they did about him is f*cking spot-on. Anyway, RadarOnline reports that Rihanna is apparently no fan of his, and won’t act in any of his movies because the late great Whitney Houston told her so.
“Although Tyler has been courting Rihanna for a year and a half, hoping to build a movie around her, she has rejected the idea,” a source close to the star’s business affairs told RadarOnline. “Rihanna has pointedly avoided meeting with him!” According to the source, before Houston’s tragic death in 2012, Rihanna, 26, met her at a party and got her take on Perry’s movies, which include the Madea series, Why Did I Get Married? and the recent Single Moms Club. “Whitney put her off Tyler by warning her bluntly that ‘Tyler’s films are for fading black stars, not rising ones,’” the source said.
I can’t say I don’t agree with her. I mean, good for Tyler for specifically creating for audiences of color, but more often than not … they’re not exactly great movies. I mean, Battleship was no winner either, but Rihanna at least deserves more than playing opposite a character who’s catchphrase is “hellurrrrrrrrrrr!”