# VH1 - Behind the Music: Britney Spears?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/vh1-behind-the-music-britney-spears/212543
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [November 11, 2003, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/vh1-behind-the-music-britney-spears/212543 "2003-11-11T03:37:23Z")
**Posts on this page:** 14
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Lux\_Interior](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lux_Interior)
#### Post date: [November 11, 2003, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/vh1-behind-the-music-britney-spears/212543/1 "2003-11-11T03:37:23Z")
So I’m surfing through the channels the other day and I see that “Behind the Music” is on VH1. I wait for the satellite to download the program info and it finally pops up: Britney Spears.
Have they finally run out of real stories? IIRC “Behind the Music” usually centers on a band that had fame & fortune and then lost it all because of death & drugs & self-destruction and then (maybe) makes a comeback.
What is madame Spears now, 21 years old? What story can there possibly be to tell? I thought all these teenage pop divas were covered in the “Driven” series.
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### Author:  [@Dijon\_Warlock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dijon_Warlock)
#### Post date: [November 11, 2003, 7:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/vh1-behind-the-music-britney-spears/212543/2 "2003-11-11T07:09:29Z")
Maybe its just a bunch of footage of her ass. I’d watch that.
“_Behind_ the Music”, indeed.
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### Author:  [@Geek\_Mecha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Geek_Mecha)
#### Post date: [November 11, 2003, 11:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/vh1-behind-the-music-britney-spears/212543/3 "2003-11-11T11:04:45Z")
Every artist who’s achieved any kind of success has a story to tell. Britney’s no different. Besides, it’s a refreshing change to not see massive human trainwrecks associated with musicians’ careers.
And really, how many bands have had fame and fortune and lost it all and come back AND haven’t already been featured on the show? Perhaps _Behind the Music_ is getting short on musicians to profile.
They could also be trying to appeal to a younger audience. Who else would care that she has a new album coming out this month?
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### Author:  [@Seven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Seven)
#### Post date: [November 11, 2003, 11:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/vh1-behind-the-music-britney-spears/212543/4 "2003-11-11T11:23:46Z")
I thought you had to be a musician to be on **Behind the Music**.
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### Author:  [@widdershins](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/widdershins)
#### Post date: [November 11, 2003, 1:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/vh1-behind-the-music-britney-spears/212543/5 "2003-11-11T13:44:57Z")
When BTM started it focused more on over-the-hill bands that have had the kind of ups and downs.
Then they got bigger names who had been around for a while but not faded as badly or broken up for good.
About the time it hit cultural overload, they had switched mostly to big names who maybe had a scandal in their past or a long history in the business. I noticed that the career “comeback” to give the story its happy ending was usually their upcoming album or a massive greatest hits package with the standard two or three new songs.
Since Britney Spears has an album coming out and music sales are still flat I guess they figured she needs all the help she can get. She’ll probably tell us about the “hardships” of being a struggling child singer who just wanted to be a star, her taste of fame followed by the painful sadness of finding out the New Mickey Mouse Club was being cancelled, her success with her first album and scorn about her sexy jailbait image, criticism of her musical talent, the “vicious jokes and tabloid rumors” about whether she had implants, how “she rose above the critics by poking fun of herself on SNL” and relying on the love and support of her family and fans, the soulmate that Justin Timberlake turned out not to be, her “wild” stage when she was “out of control”: dating Fred Durst, smoking(!!!), and trying to maintain the lie that she was still a virgin for the sake of her young impressionable fans. And make sure to tell how the stronger, more mature, “and wisened by her youthful mistakes” Britney brushed herself off and “rose from the ashes” with whatever the new album is called.
It’ll be a bigger puff piece than a Pat O’Brien _Access Hollwood_ interview. Plus she’ll probably act more in it than she apparently did her movie.
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### Author:  [@Cat\_Fight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Fight)
#### Post date: [November 11, 2003, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/vh1-behind-the-music-britney-spears/212543/6 "2003-11-11T14:32:32Z")
You forgot all the coke she did (does?) with her entourage. Wait, is that out yet?
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### Author:  [@Lux\_Interior](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lux_Interior)
#### Post date: [November 11, 2003, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/vh1-behind-the-music-britney-spears/212543/7 "2003-11-11T15:02:21Z")
> [@](#):
>
> Every artist who’s achieved any kind of success has a story to tell. Britney’s no different. Besides, it’s a refreshing change to not see massive human trainwrecks associated with musicians’ careers.
I agree, but the BTM format is more appropriate to the “trainwrecks”. But I admit that I have not been a regular watcher of late (if ever). They have the “Driven” series which seems to me more appropriate for a young superstar who is still at the top of her game.
I guess they’ll do another one in 20 years after her soft-core porn career ends in a tragic overdose 😃
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### Author:  [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)
#### Post date: [November 12, 2003, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/vh1-behind-the-music-britney-spears/212543/8 "2003-11-12T04:26:46Z")
I dunno, the best BtM I ever saw was the Weird Al episode, and Weird Al never crashed.
He said they even had to kind of make it a little more depressing looking than it was!
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### Author:  [@threeorange](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/threeorange)
#### Post date: [November 12, 2003, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/vh1-behind-the-music-britney-spears/212543/9 "2003-11-12T21:40:49Z")
“Britney Spears: Behind the Music”
Is this a commentary on her dancing?
😃
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### Author:  [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)
#### Post date: [November 12, 2003, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/vh1-behind-the-music-britney-spears/212543/10 "2003-11-12T21:50:15Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by AudreyK \*
> \*\*Besides, it’s a refreshing change to not see massive human trainwrecks associated with musicians’ careers. \*\*
So this would be Part I, right?
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### Author:  [@widdershins](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/widdershins)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2003, 12:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/vh1-behind-the-music-britney-spears/212543/11 "2003-11-13T12:05:06Z")
But inside dirt and human trainwrecks are the core of the BTM formula. The episodes without tend not to be as interesting. The Bad Company episode where the worst thing they mentioned was the death of Free guitarist (and former bandmate of Paul Rodgers and Simon Kirke) Paul Kosoff, even though he died after the band had really dissolved and Kirke and Rodgers had moved on.
Look at the fueding in the Styx episode over the control and direction of the band. Not to mention, the admission of buying airplay on radio by giving cocaine to DJs (“penguins” as they called them, since they’d follow you anywhere when you showed them some “snow”).
OTOH, the Cat Stevens episode was interesting and one of the best because of the direction his life took with his conversion to Islam, and turning his back on the life that had brought him the very things so many want. Not the typical episode.
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### Author:  [@Geek\_Mecha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Geek_Mecha)
#### Post date: [November 14, 2003, 9:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/vh1-behind-the-music-britney-spears/212543/12 "2003-11-14T09:17:34Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by kunilou \*
> \*\*So this would be Part I, right? \*\*
Either that or she’ll be featured on “Where Are They Now?” someday.
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### Author:  [@B.Serum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/B.Serum)
#### Post date: [November 14, 2003, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/vh1-behind-the-music-britney-spears/212543/13 "2003-11-14T18:59:22Z")
a.k.a. Britney Spears: Behind the Marketing.
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### Author:  [@bughunter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bughunter)
#### Post date: [November 14, 2003, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/vh1-behind-the-music-britney-spears/212543/14 "2003-11-14T19:29:11Z")
Let’s see, in the course of one week we get:
- Britney on VH1 Behind the Music
- Britney interviewed by Diane Sawyer on ABC (with the entire hour devoted to the interview, just like for Martha Stewart)
- Britney on some Football pregame writhe and wiggle show, coming this Sunday
- Britney concert special on Monday
And guess what, on Tuesday her new album premieres. Coincidince?
More like Marketing Juggernaut. The only thing remarkable about her is her sex appeal. The rest is all manufactured.
I watched the interview last nite, mostly because **ladybug** had the remote… I could have gone into the other room and watched ER, but no, I didn’t.