Britney's Just a Woman, But She Breaks Just Like a Little Girl

It's a typically hot and hazy July afternoon in Los Angeles, and even though it's a Saturday, Britney has to go to work. Tomorrow, she'll fly on a private jet to catch the kickoff of Madonna's U.S. tour in Philadelphia, but today she's in the midst of recording her new album, and her mountainous bodyguard Rob is getting impatient to drive her to the studio. She goes into her bedroom to freshen up, which means changing from her slippers into a pair of platform flip-flops and putting on a smear of pale lipstick.

Unlike the almost Amazonian stature she seems to have onstage, in real life Britney is itty-bitty — a pint-size gal with a waist Scarlett O'Hara could envy. She has a natural beauty that even the best photographs of her don't reveal. Today, she has her lashes clumped with mascara, her eyelids rimmed in gray eye shadow and her honey-blond hair sprouting into a messy ponytail suspended in a state of perfect disarray on top of her head. She's wearing inky-blue jeans that ride low enough on her hips that her aquamarine thong peeks out teasingly in the back. Her green ringer T-shirt stretches tightly across the chest whose endowment has caused such controversy. From where I stand, they look real.

"Real" is very important to Britney. Her upcoming movie, tentatively titled Not a Girl, is, in her estimation, "really real." Sarandon is one of Britney's favorite actresses because she "has a realness about her." And one of her biggest pet peeves, she says after a moment's thought, is "fake people." Being "real" gives Britney the kind of self-assurance that most young women struggle for years to acquire. "Honestly," she says, lowering her voice to a conspiratorial whisper, "I know this may sound really silly, but when I was younger, I was never really insecure. At all. Never. Now I get insecure sometimes when I go places because people expect celebrities to look a certain way. And there are mornings I wake up and my butt feels fat. But I've learned that it doesn't matter what other people think of you. You just . . . be. All I can do is be who I am and hope people like that."

After making a quick coffee run with Rob and her assistant Felicia, Britney enters Westlake Audio ready for business. Today, she's working on a song called "Before the Goodbye," one of the many new tunes she has helped to write. Her collaborator on this number is California techno artist Brian "BT" Transeau, whose most notable previous foray into the pop world was producing and co-writing 'NSync's "Pop," the first single from the new Celebrity.

BT, a gregarious surfer dude with a self-described "Nick Rhodes circa 1982" haircut, is seated at the sound-board with his sandals off and his chubby pug dog, Presley, sprawled on his lap. He instructs the engineer to play back different versions of the song's first verse as Britney sits quietly behind him, listening. "Though you're near/Still, I want to make it clear/Love, I will always be around," go the lyrics to the section under scrutiny. Britney's sultry vocals sound near perfect in every version played, and her voice is stronger and more confident than you might expect. "It's so hard to do vocal comps with Britney," BT says with a laugh. "Every take is so good. It's easier to do this with a bad singer." Cocking her head to the side, Britney appreciatively coos, "Aw, thanks, BT."

Britney recruited BT to help her make a record that would be edgier than her previous two, funky and danceable. "I wanted this album to be more hip-hop and R&B-influenced," she says. Swedish producers Max Martin and Rami, as well as R&B mainstay Rodney Jerkins, still contribute their share of tracks. But, in addition to BT, songwriting credits will go to hip-hop production duo the Neptunes, Dido and Britney's boyfriend, Justin Timberlake.

"It's pop music, but it's definitely different," Britney says. "I've changed, and it reflects how my tastes in music have changed. I think if you keep challenging yourself to do something different, people will see that and like that. But it's up to me to change. And I can't sing the same kind of thing all the time. That would bore me."

In the future, Britney says, she'd love to learn to produce her songs as well as write them. "Being in the studio a lot, I've been really inspired about beats. You get on the little machine," she says, searching her brain for the technical term for BT's G4 laptop, which is outfitted with a sophisticated drumbeat program. "I got on the machine the other day. When you first get on it, you think everything you do sounds good. And I was playing around, and I was feeling it, and I look around and everybody's like, `Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's good, Britney.' And I started thinking, `Oh, Britney, this probably sounds like such shit.' "