Aretha called in The Associated Press, and told them, “She blatantly lied on me … fully well knowing what she was doing,”, referring to Dionne Warwick’s speech made 5 years ago.
Refuting the claim, Franklin said of Dionne, “We’ve never been friends and I don’t think that Dionne has ever liked me.”
What is strange is not only the fact, that Aretha has decided to suddenly call-up the press and speak about it, nearly 5 years after Houston’s funeral service – where it actually happened, but the fact that she kept silence for nearly 30 years of Whitney’s career, when the press consistently addressed Franklin as Whitney’s Godmother, since the very beginning.
In 2012, at the funeral service of the legendary songstress, held at the New Hope Baptist church – Dionne Spoke of how fond Aretha was of Whitney. “She loves Whitney as if she were born to her. She is her godmother,” Warwick said.
Aretha herself wasn’t present at the service at that time, despite being invited, which generated a lot flack for the Queen Of Soul. She later clarified, that she couldn’t attend as she was suffering from leg cramps, however reports stated that she had a concert she was set to perform later that evening.
Few days after the service, Whitney’s mother, Gospel-great, Cissy Houston did clarify that Whitney’s godmother wasn’t Aretha, but Darlene Love. However, it seems Aretha still needed to clarify it assertively from her end.
After her phone call to AP, when she was asked if she wanted an apology from Dionne, she stated, “I don’t care about her apology, at this point it isn’t about an apology, it’s about libel.”
Dionne Warwick’s representative has refused to comment on the matter.