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Report: Beyoncé Outraged Photographers At Kobe Bryant Memorial

   DailyWire.com
Beyonce attending Disney's The Lion King European Premiere held in Leicester Square, London. PRESS ASSOCIATION PHOTO. Picture date: Sunday July 14, 2019. See PA story SHOWBIZ LionKing. Photo credit should read: Ian West/PA Wire
Ian West/PA Wire via Getty Images

Pop-star icon Beyoncé reportedly outraged professional photographers at the live-streamed memorial event for Kobe Bryant and his daughter Gianna at the Staples Center in Los Angeles Monday night by issuing what Page Six describes as a full ban on all photographs of the “diva” during her performance at the tribute, a ban that was dutifully enforced by event organizers and Staples Center staffers.

On Jan. 26, Bryant, 41, his daughter Gianna, 13, and seven others were tragically killed in a helicopter crash in Calabasas, just a few miles northwest of Los Angeles, while traveling to the NBA stars’ Mamba Sports Academy in Thousand Oaks for a basketball tournament. On Monday, a massive tribute to Bryant was held at the place where he had risen to international fame.

The live-streamed memorial, which included an emotional speech by Bryant’s friends and fellow NBA legends Michael Jordan and Shaquille O’Neal, featured a performance by Beyoncé, who sang her two hits “XO” and “Halo,” which 13-year-old Gianna particularly loved.

While Beyoncé’s appearance wowed the audience, according to a report by Page Six, her alleged request left photographers in disbelief.

“It is so offensive to Kobe’s family and the fans, Beyoncé is so controlling of her image — she usually only allows approved selected images of her to be released — so no photographers at the Kobe memorial were allowed to take her picture,” an insider at the event told the outlet. “Really, at a memorial? Not even the family of Michael Jackson did that.”

“A Staples Center staffer was dispatched to make sure not a single camera was focused on the stage,” the source claimed. “The photographers couldn’t believe it. This doesn’t help Beyoncé’s image at all, it hurts her. It makes her look like a diva. The memorial wasn’t about her. The only shots of Bey that did emerge were screen grabs from TV.”

“None of the other artists at the memorial asked for this, not Christina Aguilera, not Alicia Keys,” the source stressed.

Page Six reached out to Beyoncé’s representatives but received no response before publication.

The outlet notes that Beyoncé’s publicist has been particularly controlling about photographs in the past, pressuring media outlets to pull photos that Beyoncé’s team found “unflattering,” among them BuzzFeed, which once received a demand to pull photos from piece on Beyoncé’s “fiercest moments” from her 2013 NFL halftime show.

BuzzFeed reported on the demand by defiantly publishing a piece titled “The ‘Unflattering’ Photos Beyoncé’s Publicist Doesn’t Want You To See” that highlighted all of the photos that the superstar’s spokesperson requested to be removed.

While Beyoncé’s alleged request reportedly stirred up some bad feelings among photographers, the memorial as a whole was an emotionally charged event that included personal accounts from Bryant’s wife, Vanessa, and his fellow former NBA greats, among them the most revered of the league’s stars, Michael Jordan.

“This kid had a passion like you would never know,” a tearful Jordan said of Bryant. “If you love something … you will go to the extreme to try to understand or try to get it. What Kobe meant to me was that someone cared about how I played the game or how he played the game. He wanted to be the best basketball player he could be, and after getting to know him I wanted to be the best big brother that I could be.”

Related: Lakers GM Reveals Last Text Kobe Ever Sent: ‘Kobe’s Last Human Act Was Heroic’

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