At times sounding desperate, banging her hand on a desk for emphasis and with her voice wobbly with emotion, Britney Spears made an extraordinary bid for freedom this week.
The pop star has been the subject of a ‘conservatorship agreement’ since suffering a nervous breakdown in 2007 – this is an order, made by a judge, appointing a guardian or protector to manage the financial affairs and daily life of someone who’s deemed unable to look after themselves.
It meant her father Jamie was placed in charge of her £36million fortune, and her entire life.
And so, for the last 14 years, this 39-year-old mother of two, who conquered the world as a gloriously effervescent teenager with smash hit songs like Baby One More Time and Toxic, has been given an ‘allowance’ of £1,400 a week to live on.
Up until recently Britney always insisted she was happy with the setup. But this week the world heard, in a dynamic 24-minute public deposition in court in Los Angeles, that she was anything but.
She described how she cries daily and is begging for emancipation from what she believes is a form of legally sanctioned slavery dictating her therapy, medication and even contraception – all against her will.
Now in a new relationship, Britney says she wants to be free to get married and have a baby. She wants to be allowed to travel in a car which her boyfriend is driving. She wants to go on holiday with her children without a therapist in tow.
And – most pressingly – she wants nothing to do with any of her family or their lawyers who she describes as crooks and abusers. ‘I just want my life back,’ she told the court.
So what is she asking for, who does she accuse – and will she win her freedom? ALISON BOSHOFF reports.
