AJ McLean remembers Britney Spears’ reaction that “broke” his heart – The Hollywood Reporter

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Backstreet Boys’ AJ McLean has made Britney Spears back when it comes to ending the tutelage that has dominated her life and career for the past 13 years.

McClain and fellow band Nick Carter stopped in front of SiriusXM’s Andy Cohen Live on Wednesday (July 14) to talk about their limited stay in Las Vegas, “A Very Backstreet Christmas Party.” And when Cohen asked about their old friend, McClain said he was “100 percent Team Britney.”

“My thoughts and prayers are with her. I’m 100 percent Team Britney.” “Going back to the beginning of this preservation period, when it all happened about 13 years ago, I could kind of sympathize in that moment, maybe with her family, with what happened. But for it to go on for that long, I think that’s perfectly normal. I think It’s crazy. I think it’s totally brutal.”

For McClain, the most harrowing moment in Spears’ explosive court hearing was on June 23 when the 39-year-old pop star said she was not allowed to have an IUD removed to have a baby, which the former boy band member described as “physical abuse” and… grotesque.” McClain also claimed that Spears was very much his neighbor and that they both frequented the same mall and small cupcake shop. However, the last time he saw her at the cupcake store, the 43-year-old said, “He smashed My heart.

“When I last saw her, my wife asked me to go get some cupcakes for a birthday party for one of my daughter’s friends. I walked in, she was there, she looked right at me and I said, ‘Hey, it’s AJ!’ And she had kind of that glass face,” he said. “Like, she didn’t know who was there. It took her a minute. Then I realized it was me and we hugged and talked for a brief moment. But I could only see that this wasn’t her, like, I’m not looking at the person I’ve known for years and years” .

What doesn’t quite align with McClain as someone who’s been sober for nearly three years during his 20-year battle with drug abuse and addiction is that Spears can’t benefit from the same kind of help he’s been given. “The fact that she can’t keep in touch with anyone from her fellow, since she’s been going to AA meetings, that’s BS to me because that’s the core of what we do in this program, is the fellowship,” he explained. “We lean on each other, look to each other for support, and if someone were to take that away from me, it would be really hard for me to stay sober and true to God.”

In the band’s early heyday, the Backstreet Boys famously revealed on the July 9, 2001 dated episode of TRL that McClain had entered a rehab facility for the first time and that they would postpone their tour as a result. Carter sees an analogy between the positions of MacLean and Spears at the beginning, when the teams behind the acting career could easily look at the artist’s well-being and not have the right priorities.

“I think that genre can also relate to Britney status. You have labels, you have directors, you have people who slam into you because there is such a moment that you have to squeeze all the artists you can, at the expense of the artists’ health and wellness,” Carter said. “And I think at that point, the whole group, the four of us, got together, and we said, ‘You know what?’ Even though this is a multimillion dollar tour, the biggest stadiums and arenas we’ve ever been to at the time, were like a Stop. Everything has to stop at that point. And I think that’s the only thing in our group is that we know each other, we see each other and there’s time, look, it can all go away in a second for us, and we still have to be family and brothers to each other. This is more important than work.”

See MacLean and Carter’s interview below.

This story originally appeared on Billboard.com

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