Imagine being Serena Williams, one of the most iconic athletes on the planet, rolling up to a fancy Parisian restaurant, only to be denied entry. Yes, you heard that right. Serena freaking Williams, in all her GOAT glory, got turned away from a rooftop restaurant in Paris while she was in town for the 2024 Olympic Games. And naturally, the internet was not having it.
Instead of going to Yelp like us poor people, Serena took to X (formerly Twitter) — where she has 10.3 million followers — to air her grievances, and it’s opened up a lot of debate about what really went down. In her tweet she wrote, “Yikes @peninsulaparis I’ve been denied access to rooftop to eat in a empty restaurant of nicer places but never with my kids. Always a first. #Olympic2024.” I know Peninsula Paris was shaking in their boots when they saw this tweet. I mean, it’s not every day you see Serena venting online, so you know this must have been one for the books.
Yikes @peninsulaparis I’ve been denied access to rooftop to eat in a empty restaurant of nicer places 🫠 but never with my kids. Always a first. 🙄#Olympic2024 pic.twitter.com/lEGJR5WoEn
— Serena Williams (@serenawilliams) August 5, 2024
Of course, The Peninsula Paris had to do some major damage control after that tweet. They responded on X with a classic PR move: apologize profusely and hope the drama dies down. They said, “Please accept our deepest apologies for the disappointment you encountered tonight. Unfortunately, our rooftop bar was indeed fully booked and the only unoccupied tables you saw belonged to our gourmet restaurant, L’Oiseau Blanc, which was fully reserved.”
Okay, so according to the hotel, the rooftop bar was fully booked. And not to be on the team of the rich, famous, and entitled but do we think a table wouldn’t have magically appeared if someone like, I don’t know, Brad Pitt showed up? The empty tables Serena saw were allegedly reserved for the super bougie L’Oiseau Blanc restaurant, which is a whole different level of fancy. So basically, they’re saying Serena and her family showed up at the wrong place at the wrong time.
The hotel didn’t stop at just one apology, because clearly, when you deny Serena Williams a seat, one sorry isn’t going to cut it. They also told E! News that they have the “utmost admiration and respect” for Serena and that she’s always welcome at their establishment. They might as well have added a “please don’t drag us” in there for good measure.
Is it just us, or does this whole situation seem a little… off? Again, I totally get people on the internet who are saying that demanding a table when a restaurant is fully booked is giving entitled behavior but like, who in their right mind denies Serena Williams anything? Especially during the Olympics? Like she’s a literal Olympic gold medal winner. But alas, it happened, and now we’re all just waiting to see if Serena follows up with any other comments. Either way, this is just another chapter in the ongoing saga of Serena Williams: Unbothered Queen of Everything — despite everyone in the world testing her.
