Posted by Maura Johnston on 03/09/2011 at 1:30 PM News

The Popdust Files: britney spears

Britney Spears has mostly been letting other people speak for her in the run-up to her seventh album Femme Fatale, which comes out in less than three weeks. But she is doing a few interviews here and there—you had her zombified Q&A with Ryan Seacrest last Friday, and a terse chat with the eponymous Mr. V of V in which she either revealed her complete ignorance of her fame or was showing a surprise sarcastic streak. (These dry back-and-forths sure do leave a lot of interpretation on the table.) Now comes another Q&A! This time it’s with the queered-up glossy Out, which overlooked her telling their interviewer “I only have eyes for men” and which called her “the woman the world is mistakenly convinced it already has all figured out.” (Not for nothing, but I suspect many people feel exactly the opposite. All that mumness!) She rattles off answers about taking naps and being with her kids, and how at one point there was a rumor she was an alien floating around out there. (Perhaps someone took one of her videos a bit too literally? Hey, it happens!) There is also this somewhat disturbing triptych of Qs and As:

What was the last nightmare you had?
That someone was chasing me.

What is the rumor that hurt the most?
That I had died in a car accident.

The worst part of being famous is…
Giving up your privacy.

How the interviewer did not follow any of these questions up with a query about her feelings on Princess Diana I have no idea, but then again, this was an interview where the following bit of duality also remained uncommented upon:

Assuming reincarnation exists, in my next life I’d life to be…
A bird, so I can fly.

Do you have any phobias?
Flying, because I’m not in control.

Perhaps one of the 35 writers contributing to Femme Fatale can rework her early hit “I’m Not A Girl, Not Yet A Woman” to be about her conflicted feelings regarding flight.