Aaliyah said it best, “If at first you don’t succeed, dust yourself off and try again.” Zendaya Coleman, the 17-year-old Disney Channel star that was set to play Aaliyah in the new Lifetime biopic, has since backed out of the role. Coleman, who was ecstatic about portraying the late multi-faceted singer and her idol, says that she pulled out of the film because she felt that “production-wise (it) wasn’t all the way there”. Coleman further comments, “because it’s someone that I honor and I respect so much, it has to be 128 percent, especially for all her fans, including myself.” After Lifetime released a tweet in June saying that Zendaya Coleman would play Aaliyah in the new biopic, many fans were outraged that Aaliyah, the brown-skinned Detroit native, would be portrayed by a fair-skinned bi-racial girl. Jomo Hankerson, Aaliyah’s cousin and President of Blackground Records said, “We want a major studio release along the lines of What’s Love Got to Do With It, the Tina Turner movie. This needs A-list actors, A-list talent that can breathe life into what we think is a phenomenal story.” To add more fuel to the fire, Aaliyah’s family claimed that they were not even consulted by Lifetime regarding the film. As of now, the summer filming of the production has been postponed.
