In her new Amazon Prime Video documentary “Megan: In Her Words,” rapper Megan Thee Stallion confesses to the negative impact her 2020 shooting by Tory Lanez had on her mental health, and explains why she misrepresented the truth about her sexual relationship with Lanez in an interview with Gayle King.

Key Facts

Megan Thee Stallion, the Houston artist whose real name is Megan Pete, said she was subject to an online harassment campaign following the Lanez shooting, The Cut reported, in which social media users and other artists suggested she lied about being shot, which negatively impacted her mental health and made her nervous around crowds.

The rapper said she experienced suicidal thoughts in 2022 after her home was broken into, People Magazine reported, which prompted her to spend one month at a mental health retreat, where she received therapy to process the shooting incident

Megan Thee Stallion admitted she “lied to Gayle King” in a clip that was widely shared to social media, referring to a a 2022 interview in which she claimed she did not have a sexual relationship with Lanez, stating in her documentary she had sex with Lanez once or twice “on a drunk night,” but questioned why King had asked her about her sexual relationships because she thought the interview would just be about the shooting.

Megan Thee Stallion opened up about losing her mother when she was 24 in 2019, stating she had to make the decision to remove life support after her mother, who had a brain tumor, had “back-to-back seizures” leaving her brain-dead, People reported.

The rapper said she felt “disappointed” by her former best friend, Kelsey Harris, The Cut reported, who was with her on the night of the Lanez shooting and whom she felt turned on her during the Lanez trial, where Harris pleaded the fifth to avoid answering questions during testimony and claimed she did not see Lanez fire the gun at Megan Thee Stallion.

The documentary shows Megan Thee Stallion bursting into tears when Lanez’s guilty verdict was announced, stating: “Thank you God.”

What Has Megan Thee Stallion Said About The Documentary?

The rapper said at the documentary’s premiere in Los Angeles Wednesday night that she hopes people can “see that I’m human and what I really was going through at that time in my life.” She said she was inspired by her mother to open up in the documentary: “Once I found my mom’s voice in myself, I was like, ‘Go out there and tell them people exactly who you are,” she said. The documentary’s director, Nneka Onuorah, said Megan Thee Stallion was “hesitant” at first and sometimes “didn’t show up to film,” but praised the rapper as the “definition of strength.”

Key Background

Lanez shot Megan Thee Stallion in the foot on July 12, 2020, after a party at Kylie Jenner’s home in Los Angeles. Lanez was charged with assault with a semiautomatic firearm, carrying a loaded, unregistered firearm in a vehicle and discharging a firearm with gross negligence, to which he pleaded not guilty. He was found guilty on all counts in December 2022 and was later sentenced to 10 years in prison. The trial was notable for the significant amount of social media attention it garnered, as well as coverage by online blogs, which often posted misinformation, which some experts said was rooted in racism and sexism.

Tangent

The documentary premiered one day after Megan Thee Stallion filed a lawsuit against Milagro Gramz, an online blogger whose real name is Milagro Cooper, accusing her of spreading “false statements about Ms. Pete on her online social media platforms” and being a “paid surrogate” for Lanez during and after his trial. The lawsuit, filed in the Southern District of Florida court on Wednesday, alleges Cooper falsely claimed Megan Thee Stallion was not shot and had a drinking problem. It also alleges that Cooper “willfully and maliciously promoted” a sexually explicit deepfake video of the rapper on social media by pointing her followers to a post containing the video, though Cooper did not post it herself. Cooper previously told NBC News in 2022 not all of her comments about the shooting trial were “intended to be a factual statement,” claiming what she says “might have a comedic effect.” Nonprofit organization Unite the People Inc., which says it is representing Cooper, told USA Today the lawsuit makes “a lot of false claims against” Cooper to “attempt to stop her from reporting on the Daystar Peterson (AKA Tory Lanez) case.” Unite The People is a California-based organization that says it fights for social justice and against mass incarceration. Lanez has served as a board member for the group and hired its lawyers to represent him in his appeal.