Halle Berry has called out Drake for using a photo of her to promote his new single “Slime You Out” without permission. Taking to Instagram to voice her frustration over the situation, she shared a post of text reading: “Sometimes you have to be the bigger guy… even if you’re a woman!”
The photo in question is from 2012, and shows Berry at that year’s Kids Choice Awards covered in Nickelodeon’s signature green slime. Drake posted the picture to his Instagram on Wednesday, September 13th, with a parental advisory sticker photoshopped onto the image to make it appear as if it was album artwork. The post was promoting his new single featuring SZA, “Slime You Out,” which debuted on Friday.
On Instagram, though, Berry explained that Drake’s team had asked for her permission to use the photo, and she had explicitly requested them not to. Nonetheless, Mr. Champagne Papi seems to have ignored Berry’s desires, and shared the photo anyway. “He did have his people call my people, and I said: ‘NO,’” Berry wrote in a comment on her post. “I didn’t like that image of slime all over my face in association with his song. And he chose to do it anyway! You see… that is the disrespect. Not cool!”
Going further, Berry continued to highlight the rudeness of Drake’s decision to ignore her request. “Why ask if you intend to do what you want to do?” she wrote. “That was the ‘Fuck you’ to me. Not cool. You get it?” Replying to other comments, she expressed her disappointment in Drake, and claimed that she once had more respect for him. “That’s not cool, I thought better of him!” she wrote. “When people you admire disappoint you, you have to be the bigger person and move on!”
“Slime You Out” comes ahead of Drake’s new album, For All the Dogs. The song features lyrics from Drake referencing the Kids Choice Awards, and includes the refrain “Slimin’ you out, slimin’ you out, slimin’ you out.” Some have suggested that the lines have a sexual undertone, indicating that Drake has a desire to react to childish partners by using them for sex and then moving on. Whether this is truly the case or not is unclear, but Berry has expressed discomfort over the possibility. Responding to one user who pointed out that the “meaning of the pic” may be rather crude, she wrote: “Exactly! What does that mean?”
Another odd note about this whole episode is the person who Berry actually tagged in her post: rising indie-pop singer-songwriter, beabadoobee. The reason for the tag is unclear, though it’s possible that the phrase “Be the bigger guy” could be a reference to beabadoobee’s song, “the way things go,” which includes that phrase in one of its lines. When asked why beabadoobee is tagged, Berry only offered the even-more-confusing reply: “Yep.”
Originally due out on September 22nd, Drake has delayed the release of For All the Dogs until October 6th. “Okay, my dilemma I am faced with is either cancel shows to finish the album or I complete the mission and drop the album before the last show,” Drake said of his decision to delay the album. “I owe you all these memories we are building, and anywhere we have missed to date, we will be spinning back for sure.”
As such, Drake’s “It’s All A Blur Tour” will continue as scheduled through early October. Grab your tickets here.