Throughout much of this year, which has been declared the 50-year anniversary of hip-hop, Nas’ media company/record label Mass Appeal has put together many beneficial campaigns to celebrate the genre. These include two volumes of their Hip-Hop 50 EPs, hosting the Hip-Hop 50 Live Festival at Yankee Stadium, and the immersive Hip Hop Til Infinity experience at New York City’s Hall des Lumières.
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However, Mass Appeal has now found themselves in a bit of hot water with one of their former employees. On Tuesday (October 17), the brand’s former head of development, Melissa Cooper, filed a lawsuit against Mass Appeal stating that her superiors “discriminated against her by removing her from several high value projects, creating a hostile work environment, and terminating her employment.”
Per Hollywood Reporter, Cooper specifically pointed out behavior from Mass Appeal’s chief executive Peter Bittenbender, and Jenya Meggs, the VP for partnerships & content acquisition. Cooper did not make any mention of Nas whatsoever.
Much of Cooper’s complaints stem from the handling of Mass Appeal’s upcoming Hulu documentary titled Freaknik: The Wildest Party Never Told. Throughout her career, Cooper has gained valuable experience working on documentaries such as Lifetime’s Laurieann Gibson: Beyond the Spotlight (2018) and MTV’s T.I.’s Road To Redemption (2009). But on the set of the Freaknik doc, Cooper was shunned by members of the crew, as she experienced “venomous and racist comments about ‘White folk’ and ‘crackers.'”
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As part of the suit, Cooper’s lawyers referenced a text conversation Meggs engaged in, where she complained about Cooper’s involvement with Freaknik. Additionally, Cooper states in the suit that she believes Meggs influenced Mass Appeal to hire a friend of hers for a human resources position and then leveraged that relationship in an HR dispute with Cooper later on.
On top of this, Meggs also played a hand in Cooper’s removal from the aforementioned Hip-Hop 50 Live Festival project, per the suit, as Meggs told Bittenbender she did not want to work with Cooper.
“Cooper’s removal from this important project, along with others Meggs was staffed on, effectively stripped Cooper of her primary role at Mass Appeal,” the suit reads.
Ultimately, Cooper was fired from Mass Appeal in June before the company ever addressed any racial discrimination complaints she had previously filed.
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