Beyoncé has removed a visual of the Sphere from her tour after receiving a cease-and-desist from the venue’s owner.
The Sphere featured in a visual interlude that saw the singer picked it up from the Las Vegas strip, tapping it curiously, and then carrying it away. During last night’s Cowboy Carter tour performance, Beyoncé replaced the venue with Vegas’s Allegiant Stadium, where she will play in July. Following the show, Parkwood Entertainment shared the new footage with the caption, “What happens in Vegas starts with a BANG.”
According to reports from Billboard and New York Post, Beyoncé received the cease-and-desist letter following the recent debut of the Cowboy Carter tour in Los Angeles. The letter, reportedly addressed to Beyoncé’s production company Parkwood Entertainment on behalf of Sphere Entertainment Group, asked that the singer stop using the footage, included in an interlude for the show, which they say is used “without permission” of the Sphere and misleads fans.
“Beyoncé — many orders of magnitude larger than the Sphere venue — leans over, picks up the venue, and looms over it,” the letter reads, according to the Post, leading to “significant speculation that Beyoncé will end her tour with a Sphere residency.”
A source told Billboard that CEO of Sphere Entertainment James Dolan tried to negotiate for the singer to perform at the Las Vegas venue in the past. Beyoncé will instead perform at Las Vegas’ Allegiant Stadium on July 25 and 26 this summer. Her new video appears to be a nod towards the fact that she won’t be performing at the Sphere.
From Rolling Stone US
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