The conservatorship was also the subject of the TV documentaries Framing Britney Spears and Controlling Britney Spears, both of which aired in 2021. That year Spears petitioned for an end to the conservatorship, claiming that the arrangement was “abusive” and unnecessary, especially given that she was performing and recording. In September 2021 a judge ruled that the “current situation is not tenable,” and Spears’s father was suspended as conservator. Two months later the conservatorship was terminated. For many, Britney Spears had come to epitomize the endemic growth in the public’s fascination with celebrities, catered to by paparazzi and tabloid journalism and fueled by gossip and scandal.
