Beyoncé fans might be even closer to getting the Renaissance visuals than they think.
According to a report from Above The Line, the Renaissance visual album is completed but “remains in limbo” as the singer and her production company, Parkwood Entertainment, have been shopping it around to studios and streamers for release.
“It’s a visual album movie, but it’s like an art film, and I’ve also heard it’s better than Black Is King,” a source said. According to Above the Line, sources have described the visual album as “artsy” and “weirder” than the Emmy Award-winning Black Is King, which premiered on Disney+ in 2020.
The visual album was reportedly directed by Nadia Lee Cohen, the filmmaker behind music videos for A$AP Rocky, Kali Uchis and Tyler, The Creator.
The source claimed that a select group of streamers and studios got a first glimpse of the project approximately four to six months ago, but they ultimately passed.
The source could not give a definitive answer as to why the studios and streamers would pass on the movie but speculated that it could have been “the price and lack of replay value for the casual viewer.” They also suggested the possibility that “Beyoncé didn’t like how it turned out.”
However, Above the Line also reported that “it’s always possible that a stealth deal has been made.”
Decider reached out to Parkwood Entertainment for comment but did not hear back by time of publication.
If the rumors are true, Renaissance will be Beyoncé’s third visual album, after Lemonade and Black is King. The latter — which Beyoncé wrote, directed, and executive produced — premiered on Disney+ in 2020 and received an Emmy Award for Outstanding Costumes For Variety, Nonfiction Or Reality Programming. Lemonade similarly scored four Emmy nominations after it released on HBO in 2016.
It should be noted that Variety reported in 2019 that Beyoncé signed a three-project deal with Netflix worth a whopping $60 million. So far, she has only released Homecoming: A Film By Beyonce, which offered an in-depth look at the production behind her 2018 headlining performance at Coachella.
Fans might have been disappointed when Renaissance released without any accompanying visuals in late 2022, but Beyoncé made it quite clear on the opening night of her Renaissance World Tour in May that she works at her own pace.
In a recorded message played before Beyoncé took the stage for “Formation,” the singer boldly shut down her fans’ demands for the visuals.
“I know you hear me,” it said, per Huffington Post. “You’ve asked for the visuals. You’ve called for the queen – but a queen moves at her own pace, bitch! [She] decides when she wants to give you a fucking taste!”
