Back in November 2023, it was reported that a frenzied bidding war was underway for the right to adapt Britney Spears’s best-selling memoir The Woman in Me—published just that October—with the likes of Margot Robbie, Reese Witherspoon, Shonda Rhimes, and Brad Pitt all vying to bring the popstar’s story to the big screen via their various production companies.
Now, it seems, that battle is finally over. Below, find everything we’ve gathered so far about the upcoming Britney Spears biopic.
Who’s directing the Britney Spears biopic?
Universal Pictures has secured the project, and Jon M. Chu—the director of Crazy Rich Asians, In The Heights, and both Wicked movies—is set to helm the project. Indeed, his involvement suggests that the new film could be a musical rather than a darker drama, as does the fact that the three-time-Oscar-nominated producer of La La Land, Marc Platt, is one of the industry heavyweights poised to develop the release. Spears herself previously hinted at the news, writing on X: “Excited to share with my fans that I’ve been working on a secret project with Marc Platt. He’s always made my favorite movies… stay tuned.” (Yes, fans will be reassured to know that the singer will be involved in the production, too.)
Who’s writing the movie?
Strap in, New Girl and Dying for Sex fans, because it was announced this week that none but Liz Meriwether will adapt the Britney biopic’s screenplay. While Meriwether is best known for her TV work (which also includes Hulu’s Elizabeth Holmes limited series The Dropout), she broke through in 2011 with her script for the Natalie Portman/Ashton Kutcher rom-com No Strings Attached.
What period of Spears’s life will the movie focus on?
It’s not yet clear what the biopic will cover, though the book on which it’s based traces the Grammy winner’s life and career from her childhood in Louisiana and first brush with fame in The Mickey Mouse Club to the stratospheric heights of her pop superstardom, her highly publicized relationship with Justin Timberlake, the tabloid scrutiny which precipitated her breakdown, and the crushing lows of her conservatorship, before she emerged from it in 2021.
Who’s being considered to play Spears?
It’s still too early to say for certain, but one thing’s for sure: the role is sure to be life-changing for the starlet who ultimately lands it. Among the names being touted for the lead are Sydney Sweeney (honestly, who better to walk down school hallways in pigtails and a shirt tied at the navel than the Euphoria star?), Louisiana native Addison Rae, Dove Cameron (who, lest we forget, came within spitting distance of playing Wicked’s Glinda the Good Witch before Ariana Grande snagged the part), and Millie Bobby Brown. Brown threw her hat into the ring before Spears had even released her book, saying on The Drew Barrymore Show: “I want to play a real person and I think, for me… [it] would be Britney Spears. Her story resonates with me. Just growing up in the public eye, watching her videos, watching interviews of her when she was younger… I don’t know her, but when I look at pictures of her, I feel like I could tell her story in the right way.”
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