‘Britney Ever After’ Star Natasha Bassett Reveals a Secret About Pop Star’s Most Famous Video

The young Australian tells TheWrap’s Stuart Brazell that playing Britney Spears is “exciting,” “nerve-racking” and “petrifying”

Playing a pop superstar isn’t all fun and games, just ask Natasha Bassett, who plays Britney Spears in the Lifetime movie, Britney Ever After.”

“It’s exciting but nerve-racking at the same time,” Bassett told TheWrap’s Stuart Brazell. “Playing someone I’ve grown up idolizing is petrifying, as well, because I have so much respect and admiration for Britney. I can only hope that her loyal fan base enjoys the film.”

Bassett went all out to capture the icon’s essence. The minute she learned she booked the job, she dumped her Australian accent and started talking with Spears’ rural drawl and went on to read everything about her she could get her hands on.

“I watched her interviews and documentaries all the time. Every second I wasn’t rehearsing or film, I had them playing on my phone and my headphones,” Bassett said. “I’m pretty much a Britney expert now, if I can say so myself.”

Of the massive amount of info Bassett took in, one thing stood out as surprising: “I found it fascinating that for ‘Baby, One More Time,’ I’m not sure you know this, but the film director wanted to direct it as an animated video presenting Britney as a Power Ranger character. She thought that was ridiculous, as one might, and joked with her mom that they were going to kick her out of the country if they did that. So she was the one that came up with the idea of playing a schoolgirl dancing around a hallway.”

The two-hour TV movie dramatizes the tumultuous story of the pop icon’s rise to fame, fall from grace and eventual resurrection, which firmly secured her status as one of the world’s most enduring entertainers. Well-documented milestones in the singer’s life — including her relationship with Justin Timberlake, her marriage to Kevin Federline and her subsequent public breakdown — will all be included.

“Britney Ever After” airs on Lifetime, Saturday, Feb. 18 8/7 CT.

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