the streaming wars

All We Want for Christmas Is a Rihanna Album But We’ll Take This Amazon Doc

MerRI Christmas Photo: Frazer Harrison/Getty Images

There are 19 days left in 2019. I know that not from simple math, which I cannot do, but from the sheer amount of Rihanna stans on Twitter frustrated that the year is almost over without a follow-up to Album of the Decade contender, ANTI. On Thursday, a Rihanna headline on The Hollywood Reporter gave us a brief glimmer of hope. However, after some simple reading (which I can do), we learned that the announcement was for … an upcoming Peter Berg–directed Rihanna documentary, which Amazon bought the worldwide rights to for a reported $25 million. This very impressive payday comes a week after Apple TV+ reportedly bought a Billie Eilish documentary for the same massive sum, presumably to diversify their audience beyond the Morning Show Mom set. Previously in 2019, Rihanna’s Savage x Fenty show was released as an Amazon Original, and she co-starred with Donald Glover in the Amazon Studios film Guava Island.

According to Peter Berg’s production company, Rihanna is “is an unfiltered look into Rihanna’s life, providing a glimpse into the evolution of one of the world’s most well-known pop artists. With unparalleled access into the singer’s life and over 1,200 hours of footage, the doc takes us on a journey through private insights into Rihanna’s personality and humor, philosophies on work, family and love that are both moving and inspirational.”

It’s no album, but we’re not going to say no to a moving and inspirational journey into Rihanna’s personality. We’re not monsters.

Rihanna Documentary Sells to Amazon for a Reported $25 Mil