Pop star Britney Spears.Credit:AP
“I didn’t then,nor do I now,understand what a conservatorship is,especially for somebody capable of so much,” Spears’ friend and former assistant Felicia Culotta says. Culotta is one of a number of Spears’ inner circle who spoke toThe New York Times documentaryFraming Britney Spears,which aired in the US this weekend.
Equal parts biopic and investigative report,Framing Britney Spears charts the rise of the pop star,but also examines the complex and controversial legal arrangement under which she has no control of the fortune she amassed as a recording artist,a river of money which is still growing off the back of continuing track and album sales. In one disturbing legal document examined in the documentary,it is referred to as “a conservatorship business model”.
Raised in rural Louisiana,Spears’ celebrity trajectory is a small-town Cinderella-to-bright-lights-of-Hollywood story. She began singing in her local church,competed in gymnastics competitions and talent shows,and then at just eight-years-old was cast in a revival ofThe Mickey Mouse Club. Her fellow “Mousketeers”:Christina Aguilera,Justin Timberlake,Ryan Gosling and Keri Russell.
Pop singer Britney Spears performs in Mexico City in 2002.Credit:AP
What followed was immense success - she was the best-selling female artist in the United States in the 2000s,and is the fifth most successful overall - but then came a spectacular fall from grace. There were lurid headlines,heavily-photographed friendships with other “party girls” such as Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan,and a succession of court battles for effective control of her life and wealth.
One of the key themes of the narrative is that Jamie Spears,the father of the now-39-year-old,who had not figured prominently in her pre-celebrity life,has a financial interest in controlling his daughter’s immense fortune. According to court documents,however,he is paid only US$130,000 annually as a conservator. (By a long measure the greatest external drain on Spears’ finances are lawyers,with legal fees accounting for around US$1 million per year.)
In August last year,Spears took action to have her father removed as her conservator. In documents filed in the Superior Court of California in Los Angeles county,she said she was “strongly opposed” to her father continuing in the role. Instead,she asked for a “qualified corporate fiduciary” to serve in the role.