What Rihanna’s topless photos actually reveal
There is plenty to observe in Rihanna’s new topless cover shoot: her well-oiled torso, under-boob tattoo and barbell nipple piercing, for example. But I saw only one thing: the total irrelevance of Playboy magazine. That’s because this sexy image appears on the cover of the French men’s magazine Lui — and, to be clear, this isn’t for lack of Playboy trying to get the singer in its pages.
When TMZ recently captured telephoto images of Rihanna shooting these risqué photos,the buzz was that she was to appear in Playboy, which made me feel like I’d stepped through a time portal into the ’90s. The presented evidence was that: 1) She was topless, 2) an assistant on the photo shoot was wearing a Playboy T-shirt, and 3) she was reportedly later seen wearing a Playboy jacket.
Posing for Playboy would practically be a humanitarian act on Rihanna’s part. These days, the disintegrating brand is only a true career opportunity for un-hirable stars like Lindsay Lohan. In the age of ubiquitous hardcore porn and celebrity sex tapes, Playboy fails to register as shocking — and yet it also fails to be subtly sexy or artistic. It’s horrible at bothextremes.
Rihanna is much better served taking her nude ambitions to a magazine that once featured English goddess Jane Birkin on the cover. Playboy says, “I’ve run out of ideas” or “I have a car payment due”; Rihanna’s Lui shoot says, “I’m sexy and I’m sharing it as a gift to the world.” As Rihanna herself said four years ago, “If I’m gonna take my clothes off, it has to be in a classy way.” She said, “I wouldn’t take any money to do that.” At that point, she had already been approached by Playboy, and guess what? She declined.
These days, it seems the magazine exists simply to offer loads of cash for legitimate celebrities to ignore. Playboy doesn’t make headlines by having big stars on the cover; it does it by being rejected by them.