Patricia Williams, who was recently released from her duties as Rihanna's accountant, tell all to New York's Page Six revealing that the singer is broke, check it out the report:

Rihanna's now ex-business manager Patricia Willliams has been recently fired as she recalls "for no good reason, all in ignorance" and is "livid" with Rihanna & her management company Rebel One's decision to axe her.

Rihanna recently met with Willliams to check on her accounting affairs and was shocked to see that almost all her money was missing. She instantly accused Willliams of "stealing her money."

"I'm a professional Business Manager, I have a staff of more than a dozen, I have worked for many high profile actors, musicians and multi-million dollar corporations. Why would I steal from Rihanna?" She continues, "I showed her all the paperwork and tried to explain to her the circumstances but she wouldn't listen. She called me all sorts of horrible names and stormed off. I now feel compelled to share with the world the background story as I will not allow my name to be slandered"

The Barbados born singer has had four back-to-back albums, including a re-release since her debut of "Pon De Replay" in 2005.

According to Willliams, Marc Jordan, manager and owner of Rebel One Management has been taking care of Rihanna's financial situation with her. "Def Jam doesn't fund Rihanna properly, so Marc uses the money Rihanna makes from third-party endorsements and from tours to fund her album and music videos." Since 2005, Rihanna has been sponsored by the likes of JC Penny, Samsung, Covergirl, Secret, Venus Breeze etc,. and has gone on two major tours, most recently label-mate Kanye West's "Glow in the Dark" Tour and with PussyCat Dolls across Europe.

"I don't want to disrespect Marc's name. He is a fantastic manager and genuinely believes in Rihanna. But he uses her money to fund her future projects because he believes he can break her in the world-market. Her album sales are not nearly as close to her single sales and he knows that if she is only known as a 'singles artist' she will only be as good as her last hit. Unfortunately, he didn't inform his client and I'm receiving the brunt of it.

"Why is Def Jam lacking in funding support for there act? Why was so much money spent? How much exactly? Williams continues,

"Her record label Def Jam has put out 3 albums in a time span of 2 years. Alot of that was orchestrated through her management Rebel One. It was never Def Jam's intention to release so many albums back-to-back but Marc Jordan found loop holes and ways to make it happen.A lot of the money Rihanna made through her endorsements between CoverGirl Cosmetics, Samsung.. Notice that majority of Rihanna's videos have a cell phone in it?"

"After the release of Rihanna and Teairra Mari, Def Jam had intention to drop both acts because their album sales were not successful. Her manager fought to get [S.O.S (Rescue Me)] and quickly tried to negotiate with as many companies as possible. Nike picked up the song and funded a video. This brought the hype back for Rihanna in the company's New York office. Majority of the official 'S.O.S' video was funded by Samsung because the record label was only willing to put up a small amount. Once 'S.O.S' picked up digitally and at radio, Def Jam agreed to fund the rest of her album. Jordan instantly got a video shot to 'Unfaithful' (he negotiated with video director Anthony Mandler to drop his price and would be given more videos from Rihanna in return). Then they shot 'We Ride' which was an extremely cheap video to create. 'Break It Off' was released as a third album, but again, Def Jam was unhappy with the sales of her album "A Girl Like Me" and refused to shoot a video. At this point Rihanna was opening up for the PussyCat Doll's in Europe. She was making 30,000 a show but she didn't see any of that money because it was needed to fund her next album." Which is now known to the greater public as a 'Good Girl Gone Bad'."

The song "Umbrella" was found & Jordan fought again for Rihanna to have it. They shot the video, which CoverGirl funded half of, and the song became a success. When the record label had there meeting with Music Stores across the U.S to order her album for shipment, the number's weren't coming in the way that they expected. When the album's first week numbers came in at less than 150,000, the label was shocked. Def Jam's President LA Reid was livid! Umbrella was #1 for 11 weeks! Any other artist would have sold way more first week. T-Pain even did better in sales than her that week. Def Jam told Jordan they were no longer funding the album, so Jordan needed money again to pay for music videos 'Shut Up & Drive' and 'Dont Stop The Music'. Almost 250,000 was spent to have those videos created. Plus, an additional 120,000 to shoot 'Hate That I Love You'. Jordan was noticing that 'Dont Stop The Music' was picking up, so her persuaded the label to support it at radio in the U.S and the remaining singles, and they did."

"Then came for the repackaging of her album 'Good Girl Gone Bad', which is called 'Good Girl Gone Bad: Reloaded', that entire project was funded through Rihanna's money. 'Take A Bow' was bought through her money, the video was created with her money and so is her most recent video and single 'Disturbia'. The label didn't even want to pay a dime for anything! Close to 750,000 was spent on those two songs alone. And now she expects to see money in her account?"

Williams states that Jordan, her publicist from well-respected public relations firm 42-West, Alicia Silverman has built alot of hype around Rihanna's name but the singer has only made "a little bit above a million" and "all of it was spent on making her as big as she is now.It's not my fault that she only has 20,000 to her name."

a heck of a business manager, accountant or whatever she is.

IF, this is true. Aren't these folks suppose to provide somekind of financial report to their clients on a regular basis. A quarterly report or something. Give advice and stuff.

morningsong said:

and i'm sure her managers get these but they have their own interest at heart
and they know very well Rihanna has no business experience and didnn't even finishschool .They are taking advantage of her ignorance

Why do you think Prince handles his business these days. Can't trust somebody else

with your hard earned. Even if Def Jam had paid for the videos and recordings,

they would recoup before she saw a dime anyways, so what's the point here?

I don't care what anyone says: learn to count your own damn money.

i found it extremely interesting, thank you!

Stymie said:

Artists have to stay on top of things,and know exactly where their money is going.

SoulAlive said:

Or else you end up like Toni Braxton did when she intially went bankrupt.
. i also wonder to what degree are the artists aware or responsible in their spending habits as well. I remember during the height of Toni's popularity on laFace, I worked on a video she filmed in Florida. In addition to being very unpleasant (I say that euphemistically), I also recall that she ordered production to be halted because she would not be filmed without wearing Chanel nail polish in the color "Vamp" (which the make-up artist didn't have in their kit, although they had other high end brands in near exact shades). Video production was literally halted so that production coordinators could waste up cel phone minutes on location, then a PA could go scouring around town to all the Saks Fifth Avenues and Chanel counters just to purchase this specific shade of $20 nail polish...otherwise "the artist" would not be filmed. now mind you, while we're all sitting around waiting, since we have day rates we'll all get paid, so we don't care. Craft services will just keep coming around with more tapas and we'll all just have a Coke and a smile....but get too far off schedule, and next thing you know you're paying overtime to whatever 50-70 people are around, as well as 15-20% of the overall cost being tacked onto your production bill. suddenly that 2 1/2- 3 hours and 20 dollar nail polish (as well as the extra gas spent tacked onto the production company's final bill), well, that suddenly turns into a cost of thousands. As much as the financial team have a responsibility to protect their clients, I've noticed too that sometimes artists have swelled heads and won't listen to reason. They get too caught up living in the flashing lights and bling bling to think clearly

When the album's first week numbers came in at less than 150,000, the label was shocked.

Def Jam's President LA Reid was livid! Umbrella was #1 for 11 weeks!

Knowles Family is suing Rihanna!

Mathew Knowles, father and manager of R & B supserstar Beyonce, has slapped her rival, Barbados beauty Rihanna, with a big lawsuit.

‘I am making it public that I will be in fact be suing Rihanna for over $40 million in damages,’ says Mathew Knowles. ‘She has been in the music industry for three years and has released over 10 hits back to back to back, without ever taking a break,’ he continued. ‘That’s obviously a marketing strategy that I had originally conjured up for Beyonce ever since she went solo back in 2003, and Rihanna stole the concept right under our noses,’ he added.

Beyonce Knowles has also personally slapped Rihanna with another lawsuit, claiming that her relationship with R & B singer Chris Brown is nothing but a copycat of her relationship with her now husband, rap mogul Jay Z.

‘This b**** thinks she can get someone as slim as Chris Brown to be hangin’ with her in front of the cameras? Hoe, I’m Beyonce and I still got a guy the size of an ape,’ she said in a press release. ‘There’s no way that relationship is real’.

Tina Knowles, mother and hairstylist of Beyonce is also suing Rihanna in damages.

‘Eva since Rihanna came out with that Bob thing on top of her head, Dereons Beauty Salon Weave specials in Texas have dramatically decreased in sales,’ Tina said in a statement. ‘I’m pretty sure the two events are related to each other. There’s no way people can resist Grand-mama Dereon (manager of Tina’s salon in Texas) and her after church Sunday weave specials’ she added. ‘Screw the 'bad' economy, there's only one hoe responsible for this!' she added.

Solonge Knowles is also suing the Billboard Hot 100 for allowing Rihanna’s songs to appear on their charts, while her songs have totally gotten ignored. ‘Last week my first single peaked at #101 before falling to #196 on the Bubbling Under Chart,’ Solange said in a statement. ‘When I saw that not one, but TWO Rihanna songs were in the top ten, I realized that not only could’ve my song peaked at #100, but it could’ve peaked at #99 had Rihann not been a c*** blocker’ she added.

Jay Z, who was responsible for the breakthrough success of Rihanna’s career, is also surprisingly suing the 20 year old hitmaker.

‘Ever since Rihanna burst onto the scene, it has affected my sex life with Bee dramatically,’ Jay Z said in a statement. ‘When I told Beyonce I wanted her to use an Umbrella as a prop in bed, she vowed to never sleep with me again until the entire Rihanna situation was taken care of,’ he added. ‘It’s time for Rihanna to Take a Bow’ he added.

I wonder if Ciara is still jealous of Rihanna?

Ottensen said:

Interesting.Just out of curiosity,was this the filming of the "You Mean The World To Me" video? I seem to remember that video being mostly outdoors,in the sunshine (Florida?).

.
[Edited 8/18/08 5:27am]

Wow at that alleged report. Someone needs to really correct their grammatic errors before they start trying to make up nonsense.

Oh, and check their facts.



It opened with 162k.



7 weeks. LOL.

I find this report much funnier:


[Edited 8/18/08 6:40am]

Wow at that alleged report. Someone needs to really correct their grammatic errors before they start trying to make up nonsense.

Oh, and check their facts.



It opened with 162k.



7 weeks. LOL.

I find this report much funnier:


[Edited 8/18/08 6:40am]