The ‘Oops!… I Did It Again’ hitmaker was heard shouting over to a backing dancer as she appeared on stage at the annual LGBT celebration – which saw a huge crowd of 57,000 flock to the south England city – and it appeared she couldn’t remember where it was they actually were.
In a clip posted to social media, she is heard asking “where are we?”, before shouting: “What’s up Brighton Pride!”
Britney Army@BlessBritney
However, the audience weren’t left disappointed by Britney’s show, which saw her blast out fan favourites in a hit-filled sit across seven acts and an encore.
Kicking things off with ‘Work B***h’, the 36-year-old singer belted out songs like ‘I’m a Slave 4 U’, ‘Toxic’ and a medley of ‘Stronger’ and ‘(You Drive Me) Crazy’, before bringing things to a close with ‘Till The World Ends’.
However, Brighton Pride organisers have since had to release a statement following the show – Britney’s first in the UK since 2016 – on Saturday after fans’ “safety was put in jeopardy” due to large crowds left stranded when police shut the city’s train station and suspended services to London.
The statement said: “We were appalled to see that Pride-goers were standing for long periods of time, at the end of the event, while waiting to access Brighton Station.
“People’s safety was put in jeopardy by GTR [Govia Thameslink Railway] and the station’s failure to plan for adequate train service.”
However, GTR has responded to the accusations and claimed it had plans in place to cope with the crowds.
It said: “When it became apparent yesterday morning that attendance at Pride was far higher than had been forecast by the organisers, we put on as many extra trains as possible through the afternoon and evening, boosting capacity by 22,500.
“We continued to encourage people to leave early to avoid crowding for the last train. We ran 15 extra trains yesterday in addition to the plan agreed with the event organisers to cope with the unprecedented visitor numbers.”
Britney will now embark on her tour of the UK and Europe, with the UK leg kicking off in Scarborough on August 17.
