Teyana Taylor Talks Aaron Pierre, Health Issues With Instyle

Tyler Perry's "Straw" New York Screening — Source: Kristina Bumphrey / Getty

Teyana Taylor is booked and busy, but she took a little of her limited downtime to talk to InStyle and appear as one of their Imagemakers covers. Taylor revealed recently that she’s has to have vocal cord surgery, which happened just about the time she was scheduled to drop her album Escape Room on Aug. 22.

“I’ve been quietly dealing with some vocal challenges for a while now,” Taylor posted on her Instagram Stories. “And after a lot of back and forth with my doctors, I’ve been told I need vocal surgery immediately. They found a noncancerous growth on one of my cords that’s been messing with my voice and causing real discomfort. Thankfully, we caught it & it’s treatable—but it does mean I need to pause and give myself time to fully heal.”

Taylor, 34, is on a generational run with a slate of five movie and TV projects on the way with co-stars like Leonard DiCaprio and collaborators like Ryan Murphy, Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, and Kim Kardashian. The first, One Battle After Another with DiCaprio and Sean Penn, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, comes out Sept. 26. All’s Fair, a Ryan Murphy legal drama series with Kardashian, Niecy Nash and Sarah Paulson, is headed to Hulu this fall. Escape Room is her first musical project in five years, and the ‘visual album’s’ single, “Bed of Roses,” included some provocative shots with her rumored boyfriend, British actor Aaron Pierre whose breakthrough role in Netflix’s Ruby Ridge propelled him to stardom.

She told InStyle that she didn’t want to talk much about it, but did say, “I just go with the flow, and I’m trying things a little differently” this time. “Just protecting my peace and privacy.” She did say that none of the crumbs dropped about their relationship, including photos from a post-Oscar party or footage from his birthday party in June, were an attempt at a “hard launch” of their relationship.

She is a little more forthcoming with Nessa Diab, the Hot 97 personality who is also (as she recently confirmed) Colin Kaepernick’s wife. When asked directly if she was dating Pierre, Taylor said again that she wanted to try “something different.”

“People are praying on your downfall,” she said. “People are praying on the health that you are building. What me and Aaron have is very healthy. It’s very gentle, and it’s very soft, and it’s very kind, and it’s very sweet, and it’s very warm, and it’s one of the best feelings that I’ve ever had. And most importantly, it’s so safe. And I don’t want us to be robbed of that. He’s so special to me.”

Escape Room is expected to come out on schedule. One of the unique features of the release is spoken word interludes from actors including Taraji P. Henson, Paulson, Jodie Turner-Smith and Kerry Washington. Taylor says that while surgery came just as she was heavily promoting the album’s release, sometimes life hands you the break you need.

“It’s always easier to go to work when it’s with people that you love, cherish, and appreciate, and when it’s with people that don’t play about you,” she told InStyle. “I’ve had a lot of ups and downs within this music industry, like my love-hate relationship with music, different things like that. Escape Room is for people to escape anything.”

She added, “There are a million things that could and will break your heart. Whether it’s a relationship, whether it’s a business ‘ship, whether it’s leaving a company, anything that does not serve you, does not see you, appreciate you, value you, you must escape—sometimes even including ourselves. Sometimes we go through these stages where we’re just not us. Sometimes you gotta escape back to yourself. Escape back to the best version of you.”

See social media’s reaction to her going Instagram official with Pierre below.