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To the misbehaving star, any publicity is good PR

Britney's MTV crash not likely to be end of pop star's career

Joe Rassenfoss, Rocky Mountain News

Published September 15, 2007 at midnight

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There's nothing like a burning house to draw a crowd. This week's real estate? Britney Spears, who's pioneering new methods of public humiliation.

Recently, Spears had confined her embarrassments to smaller public arenas like bars and, well, bars. Last Sunday she took that self-destruction tour to a wider audience as the opening act of MTV's Video Music Awards.

The reasoning was obvious: The VMAs needed a ratings pick- me-up after two years of decline, and Britney needed a good showing on a national platform. A win-win, as they say on all those cable business shows.

But after the former teen queen slunk and mumbled through her lip-sync, that Britney Boost quickly turned to Britney Bash.

And here's where bad news is good news: Nielsen Media Research showed VMA viewership averaged 7.08 million, well up from the 5.76 million viewers last year. So more people than expected saw the stagger-a-thon.

That, of course, led to an avalanche of commentaries and video replays and chats and polls and you name it. MTV loves the attention, with the Britney video front and center on its Web site to relive in all its amateur glory.

Reporters were so ravenous for any comment to keep the story alive that they turned to oracles such as Donald Trump. Honest. The folks from the TV show Extra breathlessly reported earlier this week that they "caught up with Donald Trump at The September Concert, a 9/11 tribute, in the Trump Tower Atrium." Bet they really had to race to catch up with The Donald in the lobby of his own building. And do I need to address the appropriateness of discussing Britney's issues at a 9/11 event?

The Donald - already on record for supporting the rehab of Tara Conner, Miss USA - reacted sternly. "I caught Britney's performance on the VMAs. It was disgraceful. I think it was sad and I hope she can pull it together . . . Britney has to shape up and she has to shape up fast."

Or what? She's fired?

You'd think this was a deal killer for Britney's career. But was it? Of course not! It takes way more than that to melt down a career these days. Consider these recent career-killing efforts:

• Isaiah Washington, already suspected of calling fellow Grey's Anatomy actor T.R. Knight a gay slur, put it on the record backstage at January's Golden Globes by saying, "I did not call T.R. a faggot."

ABC rebuked the actor, who apologized by saying, "I can not defend or explain my behavior." His punishment after being dropped from the show? He was signed by NBC in July for a role on its remake of Bionic Woman. (Now THAT might be a career killer.)

• Don Imus enraged everyone in March by calling the Rutgers women's basketball team "nappy-headed hos." After being shown the door by CBS Radio, how has he "suffered"? He's settled with the network (read: got a chunk of cash) and now is rumored to be in the running for another morning-drive gig in New York. That slander lawsuit filed by a Rutgers player against Imus? It was dropped Tuesday.

• Michael Richards, the former Seinfeld silly guy, went racist last November during a stand-up routine in L.A. that made him the toast, literally, of the town. Oh, wait a minute, his career had already melted down.

• James Frey enraged readers everywhere when the truth came out that his memoir, A Million Little Pieces, wasn't actually the truth. He was even publicly horse-whipped by Oprah, and we know her power. Or do we? Nielsen BookScan numbers show the book still sells at least 1,000 copies a week. And Frey just announced he'll have a new book (fiction, this time, from the start) out next summer with HarperCollins.

You want a celebrity meltdown that matters? Michael Vick. But he pleaded guilty to killing dogs, for crying out loud, and will serve time in jail. And you know what? There's no guarantee he won't be playing for the Oakland Raiders in another five years.

The truth is, these aren't the old days, when blacklisting meant you didn't work - period.

In a country where more than half of all marriages fail and CEOs are constantly getting nailed for ripping off their companies, we're not so easily put off the scent of a naughty pop superstar. In fact, it's become a form of entertainment

Even if we do like to gather and watch your house go up in flames, we also love a fixer-upper. So go ahead and flame out again, Britney. We'll be watching.

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