On the Shelf
Ready for Britney Spears
By Jeff WeissMCD: 400 pages, $19If you purchase books linked on our web site, The Occasions could earn a fee from Bookshop.org, whose charges assist impartial bookstores.
In his new e book, “Waiting for Britney Spears: A True Story, Allegedly” — a mixture of reality and fiction — music author and L.A. native Jeff Weiss brings us again to the final gasp of the superstar gossip-mongering machine of the early aughts. It was the prelapsarian age of the dumb cellphone, once we weren’t all taking pictures of every thing on a regular basis and paparazzi have been commanding six figures for pictures of Angelina Jolie’s child bump.
Contemporary out of school and dreaming of Pulitzer glory, Weiss as an alternative takes a job with Star journal — referred to as Nova within the e book — to pay his hire and winds up being current throughout ugly episodes of the superstar stalking period: Britney Spears’ meteoric rise and profession lows within the early 2000s, just a few years earlier than her private and enterprise affairs have been positioned underneath a court-ordered conservatorship managed by her father, Jamie.
The Federline nuptials
As a cub reporter in 2004, Weiss will get a scorching tip about Spears’ wedding ceremony to Kevin Federline on the Studio Metropolis house of a Spears confidant. Accompanied by Bouzad, Weiss scouts a neighboring home and pays off its proprietor with the intention to witness the nuptials subsequent door. “An hour before the ceremony, the bridegroom swaggers in in his white undershirt,” Weiss writes. “The groomsmen look like lost members of 98 Degrees, wearing squiggly goatees and gummy-worm braids.” After the reception, the place Federline “removes [Britney’s] garter belt with his teeth,” the marriage occasion packs into black SUVs sporting monogrammed Juicy Couture sweatsuits: “Britney’s announces Mrs. Federline. His just reads, Hers.”
A high-speed chase with ‘Ben Affleck’
Weiss’ Britney beat is quickly positioned on maintain so he can dig up info on Ben Affleck’s budding relationship with actor Jennifer Garner. Searching for the duo, Weiss drives to Affleck’s Brentwood home. He’s in luck: Affleck materializes and hops into his automobile, prompting Weiss to tail him. “My wobbling, elephantine car is no match for his agile V12 Mercedes, but I somehow keep up,” he writes. However Affleck is onto Weiss and swerves throughout lanes of visitors alongside the 101 en path to the San Fernando Valley. Weiss is almost side-swiped by a Vary Rover, “and suddenly, it’s over. [Affleck’s] car heads into the parking lot of Bob’s Big Boy.” When the visibly shaken driver emerges from the Mercedes, it seems to be Affleck’s brother, Casey.
In “Waiting for Britney Spears,” Jeff Weiss writes about turning into an unrepentant co-conspirator within the plot to knock down Spears, one breaking information merchandise at a time.
(Krista Schlueter)
His personal tabloid story
On project for Folks journal in 2005, Weiss makes an attempt to sneak onto Brad Pitt’s beachfront compound in Santa Barbara, hoping to seize some tasty morsels concerning the megastar’s new relationship with Jolie. He has been tasked, alongside a two-paparazzi workforce, with monitoring Jolie’s son’s fourth birthday celebration. “I’m on the verge of breaking open one of the decade’s biggest stories,” he writes. “For the last six months, you haven’t been able to buy a Snickers at the supermarket without missing the all-caps headlines” concerning the love triangle between Pitt, Jolie and Jennifer Aniston. No sooner does Weiss climb a bluff and whip out his binoculars than he’s surrounded by “four goons” with Glocks tucked into their shorts. He’s harassed and at last launched, however not earlier than Pitt seems. “He shakes his head slowly, confidently, letting me know that I’ve lost.” The subsequent day, Weiss himself turns into a tabloid story: Within the U.Okay., the Each day Mail headline reads, “People Paparazzo Popped Trying to Snake Pitt.” Weiss has his first 15 seconds of infamy.
Spears’ buzzcut
In 2007, Weiss and Bouzad chase Spears — lately divorced from Federline — to a nondescript hair salon in Tarzana. “Shielded by her security, Britney scurries in like a frightened deer,” Weiss writes. From an open window, Weiss hears Spears inform the hairdresser, “I want you to buzz my hair off.” When she refuses, Spears grabs the trimmer and clicks it on: “The extensions are hacked into lifeless scraps … the stray hairs curl on the floor like writhing snakes.” Hours later, Spears’ hair is auctioned on eBay. “The bidding reaches $1 million before the online auction house removes the listing. The authenticity of the hair cannot be verified.” In her personal memoir, “The Woman in Me,” Spears defined the rationale for the daring act. “Shaving my head and acting out were my ways of pushing back,” Spears wrote.
Assembly face-to-face
That very same 12 months, Spears makes an attempt a musical comeback with a brand new album and collection of one-off performances. Weiss nabs an unique interview with the pop star at a rented mansion within the Hollywood Hills. It doesn’t go as deliberate. A disoriented and agitated Spears reveals up late, rejects the pre-selected wardrobe selections for the photograph shoot and locks herself within the lavatory. Lastly, Weiss’ second arrives. Over lunch, “Britney shrugs and summons me like she has something to confess.” Weiss is about to get his first face-to-face with Spears, nevertheless it’s a false alarm: She thinks Weiss is a manufacturing assistant. “She hands me her empty plate filled with bones and fat to throw away.”
