Cardi B has revealed that she spent $100,000 (£76,000) on coronavirus tests to ensure that the “WAP” music video shoot could go ahead safely.
Last Friday (7 August), the “Bodak Yellow” rapper dropped the video for her latest single, which features Meghan Thee Stallion and sees the two artists running through a house filled with wild animals and their celebrity friends.
As one of the first big-budget videos to be filmed during the pandemic, the shoot came with its own problems, with Cardi tellingi-D: “It was kind of weird shooting the video in the age of corona.”
She explained: “Like, we had to spend $100,000 dollars just on testing. Everybody on the shoot had to get tested for coronavirus. We had a tiger and a leopard there, but we didn’t film with them in there because of safety and because of the pandemic. We spliced those scenes together.”
Cardi, 27, also responded to comments from Tiger King star Carole Baskin that the use of big cats in the video was unethical, saying: “I’m not gonna engage with Carole Baskin on that.”
“Like, that’s just ridiculous you know? Oh, Lord. Like, girl you killed your goddamn husband,” she said, referencing a conspiracy theory shared by Baskin’s rival Joe Exotic on the popular Netflix documentary series.
“WAP” has been both praised and criticised since its release for its explicitly sexual music video and lyrics.
After the video was condemned by far-right commentator Ben Shapiro, Cardi shared a number of tweets mocking him, including retweeting images of Waylon Smithers, a character from The Simpsons, covering his eyes as half-naked women cavort in front of him.
“I can’t believe conservatives soo mad about WAP,” she tweeted.
Shapiro’s criticism was also remixed into its own song by DJ iMarkKeyz, who went viral earlier this year after remixing Cardi B‘s coronavirus video.
