Back in 2022, Britney Spears, 42, claimed she did not want a movie biopic made about her life because “I’m not dead yet.” It appears that she’s changed her mind.
The Ankler is reporting that Universal Pictures has landed the rights to Spears’ memoir, “The Woman in Me.” The plan is to turn the book into a feature film set to be directed by Jon M. Chu (“Wicked”). No writer or cast has been set at this point.
Oscar-winning producer Marc Platt, Chu’s collaborator on “Wicked|” and the producer of “La La Land” is also attached. A source puts the rights deal in the eight figures, with rights to Spears’ vast music catalog as part of the agreement. “The Woman in Me” has sold a whopping 2.5 million copies.
Apparently, a bidding war had sparked to attain rights to the book. Interest arose from Brad Pitt’s Plan B, Margot Robbie, Sony, Warner Brothers, Fox, Disney and Netflix, all vying for the project. Universal finally won out. Let’s see what they do with this one.
As mentioned, Chu’s next film is “Wicked,” which is being released later in the fall. He is best known as the director of 2018’s “Crazy Rich Asians.” His other credits include “Now You See Me 2,” “In the Heights,” “Jem and the Holograms” and “G.I. Joe: Retaliation.”
Spears has sold nearly 150 million albums worldwide, and she was just a teenager when she became the biggest pop star in the world with her first hit No. 1 single “…Baby One More Time.” A biopic of her wild career is a risky endeavor as she’s still very much embroiled in constant drama.
Will this biopic be a biased portrayal of the singer? Quite possibly. After all, it’s based on her own memoir. In recent years, Spears has turned into this controversial public figure, hounded by tabloids, and embroiled in a conservatorship case, which she was placed under involuntarily in 2008. She finally got out of the conservatorship in 2021, but that freedom came with a cost, including lots of strange behavior on her part.
Just to recap, this Britney movie is just one of many upcoming music biopics. We’re about to enter the onslaught phase with already-greenlit films about Michael Jackson, The Beatles, Madonna, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, The Bee Gees, Maria Callas. Carole King, Dionne Warwick and Linda Ronstadt.