Brandy Norwood has been through a lot in her life. For all the success and achievements she’s had, she has also faced some terrible tragedies and dark times.
Brandy’s prime was in the 1990s. As a young teenager, she released her first album in 1994 and sold 6 million copies.
She became an international sensation when she starred in her own TV sitcom, Moesha. Her 1998 song, The Boy Is Mine, even won her a Grammy award.
But things changed for her in the early 2000s. Stuff started happening in her personal life that went on to negatively affect her career.
Big Bert Changed Brandy’s Life
In 2001, Brandy met someone who ended up changing her life in more ways than one. The People Who Share reported that she started a relationship with music producer Robert “Big Bert” Smith.
About a year later, there was speculation that Brandy was pregnant. She went on the Oprah Winfrey Show with her mom. When the TV show host brought up the rumor, Brandy confirmed that she was in fact with child.
Then, she went on to reveal something else that shocked everyone watching. She said that she and Robert had secretly gotten married in the summer of 2001.
Brandy gave birth to her daughter Sy’Rai in June 2002. For a while, it looked like things were going well in Brandy’s life, but everything was about to change for her. The report by The People Who Share revealed that Brandy announced that she’d gotten a divorce from Robert a year after their daughter’s birth.
RELATED: The Tragedy of Brandy’s Daughter
But there was another secret about their relationship that Robert did not want to keep from the public. According to People Magazine, he went on Wendy Williams’ radio show, Moment of Truth, to let the world know what really went down between him and Brandy.
In the interview, he dropped a bombshell that would forever change his ex’s reputation. He claimed that he never got married to her. It was supposedly something that Brandy’s mom and manager, Sonja Norwood, had just made up with her PR team to protect the star’s image.
Brandy Regrets Lying About Her Marriage
Entertainment Weekly revealed that Brandy released a statement saying how disappointed she was with her ex, but at the same time she didn’t exactly deny what he said. It wasn’t until years later that the R&B singer opened up about the shocking incident in a VH1 Behind The Music special, per Our History.
When she first found out that she was pregnant at 23, she said that she knew it wasn’t good news for her brand.
She was raised with a Christian foundation, so she knew it was a sin to get pregnant out of wedlock. She was scared and didn’t know what to do.
RELATED: Exposing Brandy Norwood’s Fake Marriage
Brandy claimed that everyone around her was trying to force her to get married, but she didn’t want to. So, she suggested that they just tell everyone that she had already gotten married..
She confessed that it was the biggest mistake she’d ever made. Brandy said that the lie about being married was the fall of her career.
But things got even worse for her in 2006. She was involved in a freak accident that would haunt her for the rest of her life.
Sy’Rai Saved Brandy
A report by NBC News revealed that while driving on a Los Angeles freeway, her car collided into the one in front of her. The accident led to the other driver being hospitalized. The driver, a woman named Awatef Aboudihaj, never recovered from her injuries and passed away.
TMZ claimed that according to law enforcement officials, Brandy, who was 27 at the time, hadn’t noticed the vehicles ahead of her had slowed down. Lawyers that Awatef’s family hired alleged that Brandy had been driving recklessly.
For years after the tragic incident, Brandy was hit with lawsuits by Awatef’s parents, her husband, her children and by two other drivers who’d been involved in the crash. She reportedly settled all of them out of court.
US Weekly released a report which said that Brandy was never charged with vehicular manslaughter, as there was insufficient evidence. But, she confessed that it was a situation that changed her life forever.
In a 2020 interview with People Magazine, Brandy got really honest about how brutal that period of her life was. She reportedly contemplated taking her own life at one point.
She shared that she remembered laying in bed feeling super depressed. She’d ask herself if that was really the way her life was going to end.
Fortunately, she had someone who was worth living for: her daughter Sy’Rai. She reportedly understood that if she couldn’t go on for herself, then she needed to go on for her daughter.
She told People, “If Sy’rai wasn’t here, I wouldn’t be either. The place that I was in, it just felt like I wasn’t going to make it through.”
Brandy Sued Her Record Label
As difficult as things were for Brandy in her personal life, they reportedly weren’t going that much better for her in professional life either. In 2011, she signed with Chameleon Entertainment with the agreement that she would produce five albums with them.
However a 2016 report by TMZ revealed that Brandy was unhappy with her contract with the record label, claiming it was like a ball and chain. She filed a lawsuit against them in which she listed all the ways that she felt she’d been done wrong by the company.
The R&B star alleged that Chameleon Entertainment promised that she’d have hundreds of thousands of dollars to use for production costs when making her albums. But she said that after they produced her first album, that amount decreased.
Chameleon Entertainment Allegedly Tried to End Brandy’s Career
Surprisingly, the lawsuit went on to claim that the record label even tried to stop her from recording new music. She argued that this was something that would damage her career.
It reportedly was an unlawful attempt to bully Brandy into signing a new recording and distribution agreement containing terms far worse than her current agreement. Brandy told Billboard that she was as free in her mind, but on paper, it looked like she was a slave.
She said, “I’m not a slave. The kind of deal I’m signed to should be criminal to any artist.”
Her goal with the lawsuit was to get out of her contract and also to get thousands of dollars that she alleged that the company owed her for pay or play fees.
A rep for Chameleon Entertainment clapped back at her. They told TMZ that they’d taken a risk by signing an artist who hadn’t had a chart single success since the early 2000’s. They also claimed that Brandy’s accusations were her way of trying to make publicity for herself, instead of just accepting that her best days were behind her.
According to The Jasmine Brand, Brandy and her record label reached a settlement in 2017. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the last lawsuit that she got caught up in.
Brandy’s Housekeeper Tried to Expose Her
In March 2022, People Magazine reported on a controversial story about how Brandy’s former housekeeper was suing her for $250,000. The 60-year-old housekeeper, Maria Elizabeth Castaneda, filed the lawsuit against Brandy over wrongful termination and for violating state labor laws.
She alleged that she’d been fired because of her age. She also claimed that Brandy was interested in hiring someone younger to work for her. According to the court documents obtained by People, Maria had been her housekeeper for almost twenty years.
What was most shocking was the allegation that Brandy had violated California state labor laws. The documents claimed that she treated Maria unfairly, paying her less than minimum wage, not paying her during rest and meal periods, giving her issues with working overtime, and providing inaccurate wage statements.
RELATED: Housekeeper Exposes the Truth About Brandy
Obviously, the appalling story of mistreatment did not make Brandy look good. So, what did she have to say in her defense?
Radar Online got hold of court documents which revealed that Brandy had denied the accusations against her. She alleged that it wasn’t true that she didn’t pay Maria proper wages or allow her to have breaks.
The singer’s lawyer argued that her client wasn’t liable for age discrimination or failure to prevent discrimination because she didn’t regularly employ five people. The attorney also claimed that Maria wasn’t fired, she quit her position voluntarily.
She said, “Maria was never an employee and she decided to cease performing services.” In November 2022, an article by The LA Times revealed that Brandy reached a settlement with her former housekeeper and agreed to pay her $40,000.
