Club Owner Suing Mad at No-Show Beyoncé

Fri., Jun. 19, 2009 5:28 PM PDT by Natalie Finn and Ashley Fultz

RAMEY PHOTO

They didn't put a ring on it, so maybe Beyoncé didn't realize she was so wanted.

Joe Morrissey, owner of M2 Ultralounge in Manhattan, tells E! News he's planning to take legal action against the pop-R&B star for skipping out on a scheduled party appearance.

"The concert ads were on [Beyoncé's] website, our website, we had tons of people calling and coming down and we spent a lot of money setting this whole thing up," said Morrissey, who says he spent about $100,000 and put his reputation on the line in anticipation of the event, which was to celebrate the start of the North American leg of the singer's I Am... world tour.

Morrissey says that he contracted with an outside promoter and Beyoncé's manager-dad, Matthew Knowles, to have her appear tomorrow night along with sister Solange Knowles, who was supposed to sing.

View the agreement

But on Wednesday, Matthew called Morrissey to nix the deal because the club owner hadn't paid the $200,000 appearance fee the promoter had promised, and because Beyoncé needed to focus on Sunday's show at Madison Square Garden.

Morrissey told E! that, although he wasn't affiliated with the promoter, he offered to pay the fee in order to keep the plan alive?but Knowles never got back to him.

"We had contracts in place and we told them whatever the problem was or the reason [they] canceled, we would like to fix the problem, but he stopped replying to our emails," Morrissey said. "So then our lawyers had to get involved.

"So it's just a bunch of lawyers now. Our litigation team is in touch with their litigation team."

Beyoncé's camp, meanwhile, says she never had a contract with M2 in the first place.

"The cancellation of the launch party for Beyoncé's I Am... tour, first scheduled for this Saturday at M2, was a result of a breach of contract by the promoter," a rep for Columbia Records said in a statement Friday.

"Beyoncé never had a contract with the club itself and no one in her camp dealt directly with the venue. The superstar was never scheduled to perform but was to serve as a cohost and introduce singer-songwriter Solange's performance. Patrons were falsely promised a performance by Beyoncé."

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