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Aretha Franklin Rehashes Longtime Feud With Dionne Warwick: “She Blatantly Lied on Me”
When Aretha Franklin sang those letters R E S P E C T, she wasn’t kidding! The music icon demands respect — and she’s not letting Dionne Warwick slide without showing her some five years after their feud first began.
On Tuesday, April 25, Aretha called The Associated Press to publicly bash her fellow singer, revealing that Dionne made up a story that Aretha was the godmother of the late Whitney Houston.
“She blatantly lied on me … fully well knowing what she was doing,” Aretha, 75, claimed during the call with the publication.
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Aretha and Whitney in 1989.
This made her so mad because, according to Aretha, Dionne introduced her at Whitney’s 2012 funeral even though she knew she wasn’t in attendance.
Aretha says Dionne said, “Ree’s not here, but she is here. She loves Whitney as if she were born to her. She is her godmother.” Aretha claimed the statement was libelous. Not only that, it made her look so bad! A godmother not at her goddaughter’s funeral? Definitely harmful to one’s reputation.
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Turns out, Aretha missed Whitney’s funeral on an account of swollen feet. She also didn’t want to add anything negative to the highly-publicized situation. “There’s been so much going on around her [Houston], around the service, around the drugs, around her and [Whitney’s ex-husband] Bobby [Brown]… I didn’t want to add anything to that,” she said.
Whitney and Dionne in 2006.
So why is Aretha bringing up this dispute after all this time? The two women recently ran into each other at the Tribeca Film Festival in NYC.
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“She said, ‘Give me a hug,’ ” Aretha recalled. “I said, ‘Oh hell no. You couldn’t be serious.’ We’ve never been friends and I don’t think that Dionne has ever liked me.” Awkward!
Dionne has yet to comment on the argument between the two. Her rep said she would not “dignify a response” to Aretha’s remarks. We’ll be waiting!
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