Russell Crowe recalls bizarre Kanye West encounter that led to clash over song lyrics

Incident occurred after West gatecrashed a dinner between Crowe and rugby player Sam Burgess

Russell Crowe has recalled a bizarre encounter with Kanye West that resulted in the rapper clashing with rugby player Sam Burgess over song lyrics.

While promoting his new film Unhinged on Australian radio, Crowe said that he had met West several times, but that the “funniest” incident occurred when West gatecrashed a dinner between him and Burgess at London’s Dorchester Hotel.

“Kanye comes down because he’d heard I was there and he’s like, ‘Can I come and hang?’” Crowe recalled.

“So he came down and we had a couple of dumplings or whatever. He brought his computer with him. He was just scrolling through a bunch of stuff he had been working on.”

West specifically pulled up the single “FourFiveSeconds”, a collaboration between him, Paul McCartney and Rihanna, which was eventually released in 2015.

According to the song’s lyrics, the track takes place on a Tuesday, with Rihanna singing that she is “tryna make it back home by Monday morning”.

“It hadn’t come out yet,” Crowe explained. “At one point, Sam is singing along, but he doesn’t really know the words. I could see a little twitch in Kanye’s eye. I said, ‘Sam, you’re singing the wrong words, you’re singing the wrong day.’”

Crowe said that Burgess seemed ambivalent, arguing: “It doesn’t matter what day it is. Kanye, does it matter what day it is?”

The actor recalled: “Kanye just looked at him across the table and said: ‘Yeah, it matters what day it is’.”

West is currently claiming to be running for US president as a representative of his own political party, called The Birthday Party.

He has been condemned by stars including 50 Cent and Q Tip following a rambling campaign rally appearance in which he criticised historic abolitionist Harriet Tubman.