Perhaps Britney Spears should be conducting a Britney Bootcamp à la Madonna. Earlier this month, Universal announced an adaptation of Spears' memoir The Woman In Me, to be directed by John M. Chu (Wicked, In The Heights). No doubt the news sent a lot of Hollywood stars running straight to their agents. Not only is it a juicy role (Spears' memoir charts her rise to superstardom, the glare of fame, and her imprisonment in a conservatorship by her family), but a certain cohort of people who grew up with her music will always be huge fans—like Emma Roberts.
After the biopic was announced, Spears' longtime assistant and family friend Felicia Culotta (who expressed her support for Spears in the New York Times doc Framing Britney Spears) suggested to TMZ that Roberts could play the pop star. Roberts' reaction? "I was like, I love her assistant," she told Cosmopolitan. "I mean, it’s my true dream to play Britney Spears. It’s a rumor, but I hope maybe it’ll come true. I mean, I remember I locked myself in my room and listened to In the Zone and said, 'I cannot leave this room until I memorize every word.'" Roberts still sings Spears' songs to her son in the bath "all the time," admitting to a strong case of "millennial parenting."
Being a millennial would probably be an issue for this film; presumably, they'll want to cast someone younger to portray Spears' come-up. They'll also definitely want someone musical, as the biopic deal included rights to the singer's catalog. (Not to mention, Chu and producer Marc Platt are big musical guys.) Roberts did release music back in her child star days, and having child star experience is actually helpful in understanding Spears as a character. (Roberts was a Nickelodeon kid, while Spears famously starred on The Mickey Mouse Club.) Nevertheless, it's hard to imagine Roberts clinching this casting, which is sure to be a competitive situation.
But, you can never get anywhere in this biz if you don't put yourself out there, so why shouldn't Roberts declare her interest? That's not the only role she's dreaming about, either. "I wanna see a movie about Joan Didion and Eve Babitz. My friend Lili Anolik wrote a book called [Didion & Babitz]. I would die to see it as a movie. And be in it," she revealed in a recent Interview Magazine video. "I wanna play Joan Didion. That's obviously my life's goal." Let's see how well her powers of manifestation work.
