Once upon a time Brandy and Wanya Morris of Boyz II Men were a 90’s R&B power couple. That time is long past, but since then some unsavory gossip about the former couple has persisted. Now Morris has come forward to put those rumors to rest.
Morris held an Instagram Live where he addressed the details of the relationship, including allegations that he dated Brandy when she was underage.
“Brandy and I were friends in the beginning,” he explained. Her mother reached out to me as well as my manager reached out to Brandy because Brandy was a big fan of mine. I was like, ‘Wow, that’s amazing,’ because this young lady was pretty cool.”
Morris said that Brandy became a sort of “protégé” of his, and he introduced her to the individuals who would bring the show “Moesha” to fruition. He revealed that at the time, he and Brandy “were really, really close.”
“I was young at the time. I wasn’t thirty-nothing. Don’t get it twisted. So what happened is, she became kind of like my little protégé. I’m actually the one who introduced her to Vida Spears and Ralph Farquhar. They came to us to actually do a TV show on the UPN network and I said, ‘Well you know, Brandy’s down the hallway and she’s basically, she was on the ‘Thea’ show.’ Okay, cool. Introduced her to that. The show came to fruition. My mom and I wrote the theme song to the Brandy show, so Brandy and I were really, really close.”
The 47-year-old clarified that nothing happened between them until the now-41-year-old Brandy was of age, and they began spending more time together and a bond began to develop.
“Once she turned of age, we had been hanging around each other so much that there came to be some sort of connection. An intimate connection. We actually fell in love,” he asserted. “Now, we were young. That’s what happens. You’re young and you fall in love. Especially when you have the ability to be around somebody a lot. You begin to know things about them. And they know things about you.”
He continued, “Now when you’re young, you make decisions based on your youth. You don’t make decisions, moral decisions that put you in a whole position where you know that this is what’s going to be for the rest of your life. You’re learning through everything. And Brandy and I learned through a lot.”
His sharing included a story about Brandy’s high-school prom experience. “When it came time for Brandy to go on her prom, she was my girlfriend. Kobe Bryant was graduating from high school that year. Brandy was my girlfriend; she had just graduated from Pepperdine [University]. And her mom and I, we both made it so Brandy was able to go on the prom with Kobe Bryant.”
He went on to contend that he was actually the one who got Brandy to open for a Boyz II Men tour, and she was simply a friend who eventually became something more. “There’s no lie going on here,” he insisted. “You can ask Brandy and she will tell you the same story.”
He added that both her mother and father embraced their relationship, and nothing about what they had was wrong or improper.
“Relax on what you think because I know because I lived it!” he added. “And so did Brandy.”
Brandy also touched on her time with Wanya in a 2012 episode of “VH1: Behind the Music.” She said of her first encounter with the singer, “So, we met, and of course, as a fifteen-year-old I’m looking up at him like, ‘Oh my God, is this really happening?’ “
Brandy confirmed that as she was 15 at the time, and wasn’t allowed to date. By then, she’d already found herself having feelings for Wanya.
“I’m just in love with somebody,” she said. Can’t tell them. Too young to tell them. I can’t really tell my mom, she’ll have a heart attack, as a mother and a manager. What do I do?”
Of course, the two eventually did date, but unfortunately the relationship was short-lived. And it ended in a particularly hurtful way for Brandy.
“He fell in love with someone else,” she revealed. “The worst feeling is to be in love all by yourself. That feels f—-d up honestly. It just does. And that’s the only way I can really put it.”
That someone else was “Freak Like Me” singer Adina Howard, who confirmed the love triangle on “Unsung,” saying about her then-labelmate Brandy, “Two young ladies allowed their egos to get in the way and we were kind of going through it about a guy.”
For Brandy, the breakup was painful. “It felt like someone had just completely taken my heart out of my body and just … crushed it,” she admitted.
Even so, Brandy eventually moved on, telling Essence that she’s put dating on the back burner to focus on herself.
“You can’t love anybody unless you love yourself,” she said. “I’ve really learned that the hard way. I have a love for myself now, to the point I don’t want to see nobody else right now. I’m not trying to go down that road. I don’t want nobody having my phone number. I don’t want to go out on a date. I’m really good. I’m really good.”
