Seven ages of Britney
March 24, 2004
Britney Spears has travelled a rocky road from prom queen to platinum-selling sex bomb
and scattered scandal in her wake. Now shes
top of the charts again. Fiona Sturges tracks
the key moments of a turbulent career and
asks: whatever next?
1: THE MOUSEKETEER
You can't keep a good Southern girl down,
particularly one with a pushy mum. Even at
the age of nine, Britney Jean Spears, the
mousy-haired, self-styled mini Madonna
from down-home Louisiana is being
groomed for mega-stardom.
After being
cruelly turned down at an audition to join
the Mickey Mouse Club for being too
young, our would-be pop princess
promptly finds herself an agent and
relocates to New York with her mum Lynne
to enrol at a Fame-style dance school.
Two years later she dons the hallowed
mouse ears and joins the class of 1994
alongside her future beau Justin Timberlake
and soon-to-be-nemesis Christina Aguilera.
Aged 14, Britney leaves to begin her singing
career and, after two years singing in
shopping malls, lands her first record deal.
2: THE SEXY SCHOOLGIRL
The pigtailed prom queen has arrived. With
the help of knee socks, bunches and some
pink lip gloss, 17-year-old Britney lands the
No. 1 spot around the world and becomes
the fastest-selling teen star in chart history.
The song in question? Baby One More Time,
a hysterical paean to thwarted love complete
with a pounding bassline and slinky R&B
grooves. The video has Britney stomping
down a school corridor dressed in a plaid
micro-mini, flanked by a similarly saucy set
of girlfriends, and dropping to her knees and
begging: "Hit me baby one more time."
While concerned parents and feminists
everywhere slam her for her naughty babydoll
aesthetic, senior political figures and
previously discerning broadsheet writers
fall for Britney's Lolita-esque charms and
declare themselves to be fans.
3: THE PERFECT PARTNER
The American dream made flesh, Britney
bags herself a handsome boyfriend, Justin
Timberlake, by now a member of the group
*NSync, and sweeps the board at the 1999
MTV awards, trampling all over her
childhood heroes Madonna and George
Michael.
In interviews, Britney paints a heartwarming
picture of herself as a good Baptist
girl who prays every night and will stay a
virgin until she is married. Poor Justin is left
humiliated as the world is, in effect, told
that he's yet to get into his girlfriend's
knickers. Britney, the self-styled paragon of
virtue, angrily squashes rumours that she
has had breast implants and claims that her
sexual allure is simply an accident.
Apparently, finding clothes properly to
accommodate your ample booty is beyond
the capacity of this 18-year-old. Britney
and her beloved mum publish a book,
entitled A Mother's Gift, about the
importance of God, virginity and her
family. Aaaaw.
Meanwhile, a mystery businessman,
inflamed by Britney's raunchy, schooluniform-
clad antics on the video for Baby
One More Time, reportedly offers $US7.5
million ($A10 million) for the honour of
popping the singer's cherry. Poor pure-of-heart
Britney is "disgusted" and suggests
that he "have a cold shower and leave me
alone".
4: THE VIRGIN NO MORE
Acting less like a God-fearing virgin than
your average horny teenager, Britney is
increasingly a girl of mixed messages. For a
girl who proclaims abstinence on every
level, her songs suggest shes crammed in
enough sexual experience to rival the
average 40-year-old.
Then, of course, there's those publicity
shots. Church leaders are up in arms as the
starlet, whose fans are mainly children, is
photographed for Rolling Stone magazine
with one hand around a pink Teletubby and
the other pointing lasciviously towards her
pink satin knickers though why the
clergy are reading Rolling Stone remains a
mystery.
Tongues start wagging yet again as
Britney hires Gregory Dark, a notorious
director of pornographic movies, to make
the video for From the Bottom of My Broken
Heart. As if that's not enough to dent the
studiously polished Britney halo, the star is
overheard saying that she and Justin "have
great sex".
When she moves in with Justin, even
Britney's mum, her best friend and
confidante, briefly disowns her. And by now
it's not just Britney's squeaky-clean image
that's taking a battering: in spite of having
amassed a personal fortune estimated to be
$US50 million, her sales are on the slide.
While her first two albums sold more than
30 million between them, her self-titled
third album struggles to make it beyond the
3-million mark. Doubtless noting this
worrying change in her fortunes, Britney
signs up for a $US5.7 million advertising
campaign with Pepsi.
5: THE BAD GIRL
With her popularity on the wane, Britney
decides it's time to reinvent herself. We
move from Britney the taut-tummied,
pastel-pink girl next door to Britney the
boozing, burger-munching slapper. Six
months after being photographed
stumbling out of a German nightclub after
an evening of cocktail consumption, she is
spotted boozing in Las Vegas (where it's
illegal to drink until you're 21). The pop
princess is also banned from a karaoke
bar in California for demanding alcohol
despite being under age.
As well as revealing shock! horror!
a taste for fast food, Britney admits that
her proclaimed virginity was a sham, a
claim that is backed by Timberlake
himself shortly after ditching her. That's
right, poor Justin's had enough. Having
dumped his one-time fiancee by phone,
Timberlake later claims that Britney
cheated on him and exacts cruel revenge
when he casts a cuckolding Britney
lookalike in the video to his hit single Cry
Me a River.
Adding to her humiliation,
Spears's first film, Crossroads, in which
she plays a high-school babe who
embarks on a road trip, bombs at the box
office. Admitting defeat, albeit
temporarily, Britney takes some time out.
6: THE LOST WEEKEND
Britney's wholesome image is dealt its
final, devastating blow as she admits to
being sexually active and having once
taken cocaine in a Miami nightclub.
Her
taste in men leaves much to be desired:
post-Timberlake, Britney ends up in the
arms of the lead singer of Limp Bizkit and
pop's prize pig, Fred Durst. After Durst's
ungentlemanly kiss-and-tell, our
beleaguered teen queen lunges at the
actor Colin Farrell, who subsequently
refuses to be her boyfriend.
But there's worse to come: first Britney
spends a steamy night with the dancer
and choreographer Columbus Short,
whose wife happens to be seven months
pregnant. Then all hell breaks loose with
the whirlwind wedding at the Little White
Chapel in Las Vegas to her childhood pal
Jason Alexander. The marriage lasts 55
hours though we're assured that it was
never consummated and ends with
Spears coughing up $US500,000 to help
Alexander get over his heartbreak.
Britney's parents keep her under lock and
key, only allowing her out for trips to the
doctor. As newspaper and TV
commentators mourn the corrupting of
this simple Southern lass, the death knell
is signalled for Britney's pop career.
7: THE COMEBACK
It started with a kiss. The Britney-Madge
snog at last year's MTV awards was meant
to be a new dawn for Spears. But still,
Britney's unable to check her rebellious
streak.
Last month she was photographed
on a shopping expedition wearing a belt
with a buckle that read "Fuck You". There
have been conflicting reports regarding
Britney's spiritual rehabilitation, too.
Following the lead of her friend and
mentor Madonna, the singer spent an
evening with her brother Bryan at a cabbala
centre, although, given her remarks at a
British press conference (Journalist: "I hear
you've developed an interest in Hinduism."
Spears: "Is that like the cabbala?"), you
sense that she has yet to find the path to
enlightenment.
Unlike Madonna, who began her career
at 25, Britney has never been in control of
her future. Groomed from the womb, her
career has been in the hands of marketing
executives, stylists and her mum.
Her
current incarnation can hardly be described
as a step forward: the salacious video to her
new single Toxic has her wriggling around
in a see-through catsuit. Is it a last-ditch
attempt by the once-perfect princess of pop
to wring what is left from her ailing career?
Or will she, like Madonna, persuade her
fans that she's a long-term proposition?