Britney Spears has divulged secret details about her 13-year conservatorship in a bombshell 22-minute video posted to YouTube on Monday
The singer, who was released from her conservatorship in November 2021, made the clip “private” shortly after posting it on Monday morning (Australian time).
But its contents had already been seen by thousands, including The New Daily.
In it, Spears revealed she had turned down numerous paid opportunities to open up about her conservatorship, including an offer from talkshow queen Oprah Winfrey.
She said she “felt kind of silly” getting paid for an interview, instead opting to share her story on her own terms.
“For me, I don’t want any of it,” she said. “For me, it’s beyond a sit-down, proper interview.”
Spears began by recounting the day her conservatorship started, saying she still didn’t know what she did wrong.
“None of it made sense. Literally, the extent of my madness was playing chess [with] the paparazzi,” she said.
“I remember my mom was sitting on the couch. And she said, we’ve heard people are coming here today to talk to you. We should probably go, you know, to a hotel or something. And I never really understood what she meant,” she said.
Mere hours later, according to the singer, she was surrounded by hundreds of paparazzi as paramedics held her down on a guerney.
“I know now it was all premeditated.”
The conservatorship controlled Spears’ finances, personal life and medical decisions and was, for many years, controlled by her father, Jamie Spears,
Spears said she was put to work a fortnight after the order began, tearfully describing her gruelling schedule.
“My first job after the two weeks of being hospitalised and completely traumatised out of my mind, I did a TV show called How I Met Your Mother,” she said.
“Then I started working on an album called Circus and started working right away. All I do remember is I had to do what I was told.”
Spears released four full-length albums under her iron-clad conservatorship: Circus (2008), Femme Fatale (2011), Britney Jean (2013) and Glory (2016).
She also embarked on four global tours and a Las Vegas residential show – all of which she said featured “horrible” performances.
“I just remember … my performances, I know were horrible,” she said.
“I even wore wigs and all the dancers were doing all these nice sexy head-flip turns … I was just like a robot.”
Spears said she felt she was “not even human” at the time, bound by the confines of the conservatorship.
“I felt like my family threw me away. I was performing for thousands of people at night in Vegas … three training sessions a week, AA meetings, therapy sessions … I was a machine,” she said.
“I was a f—king machine. Not even human.”
She recalled the moment she became aware of the #FreeBritney social media movement, and said she “got the fire back” in her eyes after making her 2016 album Glory.
“Things kind of started taking a turn because I started getting more confidence just for myself,” she said.
“I think with confidence comes enlightenment, which makes you think better. And that’s the last thing they wanted me to do was to actually be better, because then who would be in control then.
“But it was really tricky because I had to just play this role that everything was okay all the time. And I had to go along with it because I knew they could hurt me.”
Spears said the experience was so “demoralising” that she stopped believing in God.
“I remember saying I don’t believe in God anymore,” she said.
“I honestly deserve an award for acting like I was OK. Every day. I thought they were trying to f–king kill me.”
The candid clip came just days after Spears’ first music release in more than six years.
On Friday, the singer dropped a new track with music legend Elton John, titled Hold Me Closer.
The song, a mix of Sir Elton’s classics Tiny Dancer and The One, has since skyrocketed to the top of the iTunes charts in the US and dozens of countries.
In an interview with The Guardian, Sir Elton described how the pair decided to work together, saying he was “thrilled” with Spears’ rendition.
“She sang fantastically,” he said.
“Everyone was saying they don’t think she can sing any more. But I said, she was brilliant when she started so I think she can. And she did it, and I was so thrilled with what she did.”
Spears is set to share more details about the conservatorship in an upcoming memoir, scheduled to be released sometime in 2023.
