The world is going to know Kanye West even more intimately than before when the three-part Netflix docuseries, jeen-yus: A Kanye Trilogy is released in February. As the project gets closer to its premiere, however, the Donda rapper seems to be getting antsy about creative control, and he just put Netflix on the spot, making some demands before the project is made available to the public.
jeen-yus: A Kanye Trilogy dates all the way back to 1998, when Clarence “Coodie” Simmons interviewed 21-year-old Kanye West, documenting his move to New York City to try to break onto the scene, all the way to present day, which sees him as a global icon in rap, producing, and fashion. Despite working with longtime collaborators Coodie & Chike (Chike Ozah) on the project, Ye took a break from dissing Pete Davidson to call out Netflix via Instagram and demand final say on the product before it’s released.
Anyone familiar with Kanye West can imagine how hard it must be for him to give creative control to anyone whose name isn’t Ye. Demanding that Netflix allow him into the editing room just two days before Part 1 of the trilogy, “Vision,” is set to premiere at the Sundance Film Festival seems extreme — or super on-brand.
To be fair, Kanye West said he wants to see the series before its release on Netflix, which is scheduled for February 16, so maybe the Sundance premiere isn’t his most pressing concern. It still seems like what’s done is done, though, and with decades of material to work with, saying that Coodie & Chike — and certainly the rapper too — have put a lot of effort into this project is probably an understatement.
Coodie responded to Kanye West’s demands, telling IndieWire that while the rapper hasn’t seen the finished product, his team has.
His team has seen it and I believe they showed him something. But I’m not certain. I haven’t had a conversation with Kanye about it. We have to be true to the story. We can’t sugarcoat nothing. Everybody is going to have their own opinion. I would hope he appreciates everything, because we’re just showing real life. We’re not making anything up, we didn’t write it. Anything that he did that he might cringe on, is what was done.
While it’s true that all the footage will be real, how that footage was edited and how the narrative is presented makes a huge difference in what kind of light Kim Kardashian's estranged husband will be painted. The fact that they likely captured the good, bad, and ugly of the icon’s rise does beg a lot of questions about what the doc might hold. I’m sure Ye takes absolutely no comfort in the fact that his team has apparently seen it and not him.
We’ll have to see if and how Netflix responds to this situation, and if Kanye West does in fact make it into the editing room to have a final say in how the world views his story. jeen-yus: A Kanye Trilogy is set for release on Netflix on Wednesday, February 16. In the meantime, take a look at the best shows on Netflix right now, and check out our 2022 TV Schedule to see what premieres are coming soon.
