Aretha Franklin Plans 5-Star Club to Celebrate Detroit's Revival

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The “Queen of Soul” wants to show her hometown some R-E-S-P-E-C-T.

In an exclusive interview with WWJ/CBS Detroit, Aretha Franklin said she and billionaire businessman Dan Gilbert are collaborating on a five-star entertainment complex in downtown Detroit that will rival anything Motown has ever seen.

“I’m just glad that Detroit came through the bankruptcy with flying colors and I love that the city is enjoying a renaissance now, and I’m going to be part of that renaissance,” Franklin said. “I’ve been downtown with Dan Gilbert’s people and I’ve found a location for myself, so stay tuned. A lot of good stuff coming up.”

Franklin described the entertainment complex, which she hopes will be operational within a year, as “a combination venue which would be a five-star night club for dining and dancing, the band, the whole nine yards, a museum and something like L’Esprit, the disco.”

She said the project would fill a void in Detroit and return the city to its “good ol’ days.”

“We don’t have any discos and we don’t have any real fine dining and adult venues, I would say. For adults, we just don’t have it so I’m going to try to bring it,” she said.

Franklin, who makes her first appearance at Chene Park’s riverside amphitheater at a Saturday concert, said she will pitch the idea to her record company and to General Motors, which she said was interested in backing a disco in the 1980s.

“They wanted to do a disco then, so I’ll see if we can renew that interest,” she told WWJ.

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Press photo by Matthew Jordan Smith