Spears reconnects with fans in Circus

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — When Britney Spears kicks off her first tour in five years, it may seem as if she’s picking up where she left off in 2004: She’ll be promoting a platinum album with a grandiose stage show, a chiseled body and elaborately choreographed moves on display.

But whereas her last tour was more like a coronation, Spears’ The Circus tour marks another step in the ongoing rehabilitation of Spears’ image and her career.

In the past five years, Spears has gone through more tumult than many endure in a lifetime. She’s been married and divorced, had two kids, gone to rehab, gone through a custody battle, found herself briefly committed to a psychiatric hospital, and been so out of control that her father, Jamie Spears, was appointed by a court to oversee his daughter’s personal and professional affairs indefinitely.

But over the past year, Spears’ life and career has rebounded. Her Circus CD, released in December, has already sold more than 1.3 million copies, and she’s had two hits off the CD, the No. 1 Womanizer and the Top 5 Circus.

Spears’ comeback has been carefully orchestrated, beginning with well-received appearances on the sitcom How I Met Your Mother last year to her comeback appearance at the MTV Video Music Awards last fall following her disastrous performance on the awards show in 2007. She has given few interviews, and those that have been granted have been heavily managed.

Circus tour, which takes her to 27 cities in the US before heading to Europe in June, is her biggest opportunity to connect with her fan base. The tour is to feature a mix of her new materials and some of the hits that made her one of the world’s top-selling artists.