Rita Ora Denies Rumor She Was 'Becky' on Beyoncé's 'Lemonade': 'Take Things with a Pinch a Salt'

The pop vocalist spoke to U.K. interviewer Louis Theroux on his BBC podcast about the rumor that Beyoncé's infamous "Sorry" lyric was about her

Rita Ora and Beyoncé. Photo: Kate Green/Getty; Albert L. Ortega/Getty

For Rita Ora, it's time to make lemonade out of lemons.

More than six years after talk surfaced that Ora was "Becky with the good hair" in Beyoncé's hit song "Sorry," the U.K.-based pop star, 32, is shutting down the rumor mill.

"Oh my god, it literally was a coincidence," Ora told Louis Theroux in a recent interview on his BBC podcast, Louis Theroux Interviews... "I didn't even think about it, I swear. And it wasn't a J, it was an R. They flipped it 'round and then it looked like a J," she says of the necklace featuring her first initial that she wore in a contentious 2016 Snapchat photo that led fans to believe the lyric was about her.

Theroux then asked Ora if the lemon-applique bra she was sporting in the same snap was in any way meant to inspire intrigue about JAY-Z in the wake of wife Beyoncé debuting the 2016 album Lemonade.

Rita Ora. David M. Benett/Dave Benett/Getty for W Algarve

Ora was emphatic in her rebuttal.

"No, it had nothing [to do with it]. No, that was my own design with an underwear company called Tezenis that I was working with," she said.

"This is what I mean, man. A pinch of salt," she continued. "You've got to take things with a pinch of salt. And that's what's insane. I had to just sit through that until a good friend of mine, Katy Perry, gave me a hilarious badge that said 'not Becky'."

Beyoncé, for her part, led awards season that year, scoring nine Grammy nominations for Lemonade and winning two awards. The album was filled with themes of infidelity throughout its lyrics, leading many fans to assume JAY-Z may have cheated on his wife.

Track 3 on the album, "Sorry", features the now-popular lyrics, "You only want me when I'm not there / You better call Becky with the good hair."

Ora's ill-timed Snapchat left many to incorrectly assume she was "Becky," and that both the lemon bra and 'J' necklace were nods to possible involvement with JAY-Z.

And Ora isn't the only woman thought to have been Becky, either. In the hours following the album's release, Rachel Roy, the ex-wife of one of JAY-Z's friends, posted a since-deleted Instagram with the caption, "Good hair don't care, but we will take good lighting, for selfies, or self truths, always" — the "good hair" part of which many took to be a reference to Beyoncé's lyrics.

Becky, for her part, has no confirmed identity six years post-Lemonade.

"It's interesting 'cause I feel like everyone is very interested in my personal life, like everything else is not worthy enough," Ora concluded during her interview with Theroux. "Which, sometimes, is frustrating because I have also got a lot of credentials to sustain my respect."