I’m still shook about Beyonce and Jay-Z’s “Apesh-t” video. I went into it cold, not expecting anything other than some cool imagery and a good song. It took me a second to realize… “holy sh-t, they shot this IN THE LOUVRE.” Very few people get to shoot anything in the Louvre. It’s not hotbed of fulfilled filming-location requests, because the Louvre is one of the biggest tourist attractions (if not the biggest) in Paris. There’s just no way that the museum could shut down to allow film productions or video productions to shoot there all the time. But they made an exception for Beyonce. So maybe that Illumanti sh-t is real – the head of the Louvre must be the grand master of Priory of Sion, and Beyonce is descended from… wait, I mixed up the plot of The DaVinci Code again. Anyway, apparently the Louvre allowed Bey and Him to shoot in the museum because… they, like, visited it a few times.
David. Géricault. Da Vinci! They were just a few of the artists Beyoncé and Jay-Z strategically featured in their new “Apesh*t” music video — performing under the name the Carters — mostly because, oh, you know, they were given private access to the Louvre to groove around whichever masterpieces they wanted. As us plebeians can’t usually get close enough to the “Winged Victory of Samothrace” without being yelled at by another patron to move out of their photo, we couldn’t help ponder to Apollo, the Greek god of the arts: How was the museum able to grant such a big request? And remain secretive about the whole damn thing? Silly us. Like the Louvre wouldn’t do anything for Beyoncé.
“Beyoncé and Jay-Z visited the Louvre four times in the last ten years. During their last visit in May 2018, they explained their idea of filming,” a spokesperson for the museum told Vulture. “The deadlines were very tight but the Louvre was quickly convinced because the synopsis showed a real attachment to the museum and its beloved artworks.” Quickly convinced! Tight deadlines! The Palace of Versailles could never.
My mind is still blown, honestly. Can you even imagine the amount of coordination, and all of it done without anyone breathing a word? They had to have the dancers all ready, and the routine ready too. They had to have all of the costumes worked out ahead of time. They had a director who knew how to film everything in that narrow time frame – my assumption is that they were probably only given one night, MAYBE two nights – and they had to not only get the dancing and posing, but they had to get beauty shots of all of the artwork. It’s insane.
Screencaps courtesy of Bey and Him, additional photos courtesy of Backgrid.
I love it!
That’s some really serious good work. There should be a documentary explaining how they did it and how all the people involved kept their mouth shut.
MTV’s Making the Video was really one of the most interesting shows of its time. I learned so much of the behind the scene stuff and what all went into a 3 minute music video from that show. Fascinating.
their camps are the best at having no leaks. when her Lemonade album was released, even the record label didn’t know about it.
Don’t all artists shoot top secret videos and get stuff done under various types of deadlines?
Not like this.
You can rent out the museums in Paris in the evenings for events and I suppose filming a video.
The French company my husband worked for used to do their staff Xmas parties in the museums. We did the Louvre, Musee d’Orsay, The Primitive Arts Museum and another that had to do with textiles near the Trocadero.
You don’t need to have an “in”. You just need to book it and have the $$ to pay for it. From one of the websites touting this:
“Corporate Events
Finally, the Louvre frequently opens its doors for private corporate events, offering a superb backdrop for a company anniversary or other key event.”
But this is a nice story for people who don’t know that.
I love people with the know!
HA! merci pour en partager 🙂
OMG I would have loved a private event at the Musee d’Orsay, it’s by far my favorite. I could spend days in there.
Thank you. It sounds more exclusive than it is.
OOh lucy2 you and I need to do a museum trip together. Musée d’Orsay is one of my favorites too along with the fashion museums.
French museums wonderful websites with loads of photos from collections throughout Paris and other parts of France.
Yeah I was about to say the same thing. You can pretty much rent out any museum if you have the money to pay. The Louvre has allowed filming before, it allowed filming for the Davinci Code. Beyonce and Jay-Ze aren’t breaking any boundaries here, apart from maybe it being the first music video filmed in the Louvre.
Yet no one did a music video here before them, so yeah that is a really nice story.
Money gets you most places I guess.
I’m surprised by how much I love everything about this.
I always figured that they shot it on Tuesday since the Louvre is closed on Tuesdays.
“The deadlines were very tight but the Louvre was quickly convinced because the synopsis showed a real attachment to the museum and its beloved artworks.”
In other words: money. And the money coming from tourists wanting to stand where Jay and B stood as well.
I stood in that exact spot in 1961. For the art.
That’s great. Most people would go for the art as well, myself included. But now fans of this couple maybe would like to recreate or just have bragging rights of standing where they stood. It happened before with a B album hence why I thought about it. And it would boost tourism and there’s nothing wrong with that.
Jay Z looks tired and like simply going through the motions these days.
they both look tired
I had fun explaining to my coworkers how to pronounce “Louvre,” since it’s one of two French words that I’m certain how to say properly that nobody in my region does right. (The other is “Versailles,” if you’re curious.)
😂😂 meeeeee
When I went to Paris, the line to get in to the Louvre was insane (hours long). We didn’t get to go in.
Me neither. Everytime I’m there* it’s hours long. Naaaah. So.. thanks for the video, now I’ve finally seen some inside bits 😀
* living near france, not a big deal.
I looooooooovvvvvvveee this song and the video. I’m so in love with it that I’m emotional. While some are endorsing the racist-in-chief and denegrating their own people for white validation and a few coins, the Carters are celebrating black excellence. Apeshit video is a masterpiece. End of Story.
FACTS
Can not wait for the album to be available through Amazon Music. I have heard great things about this album. Quotes have been dropping and you can tell it’s about #blackpower
it’s on amazon and spotify now
I must be really out of the pop game, but are they making an album together? Is this a song off his last album? Someone help 😫.
I’m not surprised by how good they were at keeping it secret considering Bey’s been doing the whole secrecy thing for a couple years now. What a lucky privilege tho I’m jealous 😍
I wasn’t feeling her outfit in the video thumbnail at first, but now it’s growing on me. Hair and jewels are great!
AlsosheneedstoditchJaypleaseandthanks
The album already dropped on Tidal only for now 😉
It’s on Spotify too!!!!!! I’m fully dead my morning has been made 😊😊😊. Lemonade still isn’t on there thoooooo 😫
I can’t stand Jay. He’s made antisemitic slurs on two albums but no one cares. When he does something worse like litter in a National Park or homeschool the twins THEN people will care.
I love Jay’s styling. Love his hair.
I heavily dislike him but I love this hairstyle in general…with Jay it flatters his face as well.
I love this style as well, and it’s important to see. My mom, bless her heart says she doesn’t mind natural hair but keeps calling my hair and my son’s hair messy, undone. She actually said my 13 month olds wash and go looked like I don’t know how to do his hair. More people should see black men with natural hair, not shaved down or “waves” but their natural hair.
Way too many Black folks don’t understand how CUTTING that remark is regarding our natural hair…cause mines is 4C to the NTH DEGREE!!! My favorite thing now is how now…you can even buy WIGS that celebrate your natural, nappy/kinky hair!!! Which I do…because I LOVE COLOR…but my hair and scalp is NOT about THAT LIFE!
Lala, I am so tired of hearing that “I have lost control of my hair” and that my son’s hair is nappy. We have 4a curl size, and you can actually see the spiral, big freaking deal! My mom suggests buying hats for my son to wear when he is with her and even apologized for his hair “she doesn’t know how to work it” when family members saw him for the 1st time. Girl I understand about 4c because I hear the cutting remarks all the time. My step-sons are 4b and they often say the meanest things about each other’s hair. Yeesh, the programming is so strong.
I was also noticing his hair here, I like it.
You can shoot in and outside of the Louvre but you have to be flexible and work to tight deadlines i.e. night shoots or 1 day shoots when the museum is closed (which is a Tuesday I think).
I wouldn’t necessarily say they got special treatment, sounds like the Museum liked the idea about using the priceless art work as part of the story of the video and its great PR for them. They let them film the DaVinci code on the premises.
The Louvre is closed every Tuesday (if you ever plan to visit). Also to have all the dancers, routine and costumes ready is, I would say, bare minimum for any production. It requires professionalism but nothing out of the ordinary.
What bothers me is the painting subjected to all of this spotlights. That can’t be good…
I would assume they have an expert art historian on hand to ensure no paintings are subject to harmful levels of light. I would hope so, anyway!
It’s not that difficult to rent the Louvre: the cost to do so is posted online. You know, like most public (and private) art galleries looking to bring in extra cash from private sources.
It ain’t cheap but movie, video, and fashion shoots are filmed there all the time.
https://www.louvre.fr/sites/default/files/medias/medias_fichiers/fichiers/pdf/louvre-private-events-2015.pdf
According to this article, in the past 10 years, the Louvre has become much more open to film production, and hundreds of varying projects have filmed there, both inside and on the grounds.
https://variety.com/2016/film/global/paris-the-louvre-120-productions-2015-1201695897/
I thought the video was visually beautiful, but filming there is not that rare an occurrence. It’s closed Tuesdays, so filmmakers can have access Monday evening through Wednesday morning, which I’m assuming they did with this video, probably over a few weeks.
Keeping it quiet that Beyonce and Jay Z were filming there though, is very impressive.
I’m not sure why this is such a big deal. The Lourve has all kinds of packages for people wanting to tour it privately. It’s extremely expensive obviously, and if you want any kind of specialized tour you have to know who to talk to, but there’s pretty much always someone experiencing it after hours and on Tuesdays. Every year my company pays for a days access on a Tuesday. It’s just like renting out Disneyland for a private event/visit. Ridiculously pricy but not at all rare.
It’s not a rare filming location either. Hollywood films tend to be shut out since the logistics of getting a big film production in there in a short time frame are nightmarish, but a lot of smaller stuff gets in no problem. A music video really wouldn’t present any issues.
All I wanna say is this album is unapologetically BLACK and y’all will deal. Idc. I read some of awful opinions in yesterday’s post about them and it amazes me that people still refused to acknowledge this excellence simply because you don’t like the Carters. It was the same with Lemonade though so I shouldn’t be surprised. It’s very easy to dismiss something that doesn’t speak to you and isn’t for you.
Not everyone likes the same music. I can’t stand rap, pop or country music, and it has NOTHING to do with skin color. I have no opinion of this album, because it’s not music I listen to
So if you don’t have an opinion about the album then you’re not one of the people I was calling out in my post…
And many of the comments that come up on every Beyonce post ARE racist and dog whistley… always have been
Just because people didn’t like it doesn’t mean they don’t understand or appreciate it. They just didn’t like it. Sheesh.
I love the album too! Comments about Beyoncé here are sadly the same old, same old. That woman’s success drives them CRAZY. Why won’t they do something useful with all that time, I don’t know.
Straight FACTS. The album is fire. People are gonna be mad regardless of what Beyonce does bc they can’t stand her. Most haven’t even listened to the album.
Reminds me of how she got bashed for bringing Blue Ivy to an award show and Pink got nothing but positive comments in a post about her bringing her daughter to the very same show. It’s not about race though… 🙃
In the last picture…does Bey have Madonnas face? Not the current one, but the Britney and Christina kiss era face?
I was thinking more Janet Jackson.
I don’t know what she is doing to her face I wish she would stop. She is freaking Beyoncé for FFS!
I don’t find the fact they filmed there impressive as the Louvre has allowed filming for all sorts of things (including the Davinci Code). Maybe the video is impressive, I’ll have to watch it after work.
What I found more impressive was the fact that the show Sense8 managed to film a wedding scene/party on the Eiffel Tower at night after it was closed to the public (sorry for spoiler, won’t say whose wedding it was). I just watched it this past weekend and I was like that can’t be the real Eiffel Tower? I didn’t realize the Eiffel Tower allowed filming so I looked it up to see if it was a set, but no they actually filmed on the Eiffel Tower at night. Apparently the Sense8 crew had a very limited window of time in which they could film as the weather was bad and it was raining and foggy.
After the technical marvel of Beychella, this does not surprise me. The woman and her team are pros.
Love the video, wasn’t sure about the song at first, but it’s growing on me quickly. I like Jay-Z’s hair and Bey looks great as always. I don’t understand why this is so surprising; they’ve obviously got the money and the exposure seems like it’d be a win/win for the Louvre as well. Mostly likely the dancers and everyone practiced extensively before taking it to the Louvre to keep to a tight shooting schedule.
I feel very uncool for feeling it, but I hate it. I can’t stand the song or the video. I don’t get it. The video has a creepy Stanley Kubrick vibe to it.