Sean “Diddy” Combs has hit out at Netflix and long-time rival 50 Cent over a newly released docuseries about his life and controversies.
The disgraced rapper and music mogul, 56, is months into his four-year sentence for prostitution-related charges.
Accusing Netflix of incorporating stolen footage, he called the new four-part series Sean Combs: The Reckoning a “shameful hit piece”.
The series claims to deliver a “staggering examination of the media mogul, music legend and convicted offender”, and offer viewers previously unreleased footage of Combs and his inner circle. It will also feature two jurors from Combs’s trial, who, for the first time, will discuss how they arrived at their mixed verdict.
A teaser clip released on Monday (1 December) depicts Combs in September last year, filmed as pressure mounted against him in his federal sex-crime investigation.
“We’re losing,” he says in a hotel room, cell phone in hand, before he calls for “somebody that’ll work with us that has dealt in the dirtiest of dirty business”.
Combs has alleged that the footage, including “private moments, pre-indictment material from an unfinished project and conversations involving legal strategy”, was obtained through unlawful means. .
“Today’s GMA teaser confirms that Netflix relied on stolen footage that was never authorised for release,” the statement from his spokesperson reads. “As Netflix and CEO Ted Sarandos know, Mr Combs has been amassing footage since he was 19 to tell his own story, in his own way. It is fundamentally unfair, and illegal, for Netflix to misappropriate that work.”
It continued: “None of this was obtained from Sean Combs or his team, and its inclusion raises very serious questions about how this material was accessed and why Netflix chose to use it.”
The rapper’s legal team has contacted Netflix, according to the statement.
The Independent has contacted a representative of Netflix for comment.
Combs blamed the series on a “personal vendetta” against him by longtime rival 50 Cent who serves as an executive producer on the series and who has been promoting the series alongside director Alexandria Stapleton on Good Morning America. Combs’s statement was issued hours after their appearance.
The duo did not discuss how they obtained the footage, though in a statement posted to Netflix’s Tudum website, Stapleton said: “It came to us, we obtained the footage legally and have the necessary rights. We moved heaven and earth to keep the filmmaker’s identity confidential.
“One thing about Sean Combs is that he’s always filming himself, and it’s been an obsession throughout the decades. We also reached out to Sean Combs’ legal team for an interview and comment multiple times, but did not hear back.”
50 Cent, real name Curtis James Jackson III, rebuffed the idea that the series is a result of his “disdain” for Combs, which previously resulted in a diss track aimed at Combs back in 2006.
“It’s not personal,” he said. “If I didn’t say anything,” he said, the world might have thought “hip-hop is fine with his behaviours. There’s no one else being vocal”.
Stapleton added: “I think it’s important to also let people know, this show isn’t completely the perspective of people who didn’t like Sean. We weren’t just trying to get the highlights, the salacious details.
“The real goal was to storytell, and not everyone needed to have an allegation to be a part of this project.”
The documentary comes months after Combs was found guilty in July on two counts tied to prostitution, but acquitted on the most serious charges in his sex trafficking trial at a federal court in New York City.
The convictions cap his public downfall after a trial in which his penchant for kinky sex “freak-offs” was aired almost daily, but also serve as a win for the music icon, who was found not guilty of other charges that could have led to life imprisonment.
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