Rita Ora ready to rock Hong Kong for the first time at Landmark show
The British performer, on the cusp of global stardom, says she doesn't understand why recent duet with Chris Brown is controversial
Hong Kong-bound British pop singer Rita Ora says she has stopped paying much attention to the things people say about her.
This is probably why she didn’t know about the backlash surrounding her recent single, Body on Me, a collaboration with Chris Brown. Brown, of course, was convicted of felony assault for his 2009 attack on Rihanna, an incident for which he seems largely unrepentant. Tell Ora that her Brown co-sign has caused an uproar among many on social media, including feminists, and she seems amazed.
“Really? I think that’s hypocritical, because being a feminist means giving women the same opportunities as men, so women shouldn’t turn around and try and take men’s opportunities away,” Ora says. “I think it’s [time] for me to go and re-evaluate the term of ‘feminism’ if they think that’s what that means. I just think he’s a great artist. I don’t think anything else matters, really. He’s great, he’s a really, really great guy and a great actor.”
Ora – who is 24 and constantly on the verge of happening – is performing at the Landmark Atrium on October 16, marking her first-ever live show in Hong Kong. This year she will likely release her first album since 2012; her team hopes and expects it will make her as famous in America as she is in Europe. She’s currently in a dangerous place, one of those people who is vaguely understood to be famous, even if no one is sure for what.
She is everywhere: on the cover of magazines, in movies, on red carpets, as a spokesmodel, performing at the Academy Awards, in a guest run on Empire, on British incarnations of both The Voice and The X Factor.
An impressive group of people have conspired, or at least it feels like it, to make Rita Ora happen. She’s signed to Jay Z’s Roc Nation conglomerate. She guested on Iggy Azalea’s hit Black Widow. She had small acting roles in Fifty Shades of Grey and the Jake Gyllenhaal movie Southpaw. Movie mogul Harvey Weinstein has taken her under his wing. “I met Harvey, who produced [Southpaw] through Georgina, his wife, who’s a designer. She was the first one to give me a dress for the red carpet. He’s great. He’s very smart.”