A year after her disastrous performance at the MTV Video Music Awards, Britney Spears opened the event's 25th annual installment in anticlimactic fashion, going away the vocalizing to others.
After weeks of hype, the pop vocalizer took the stage just to deliver four sentences, shielding her lower face with her microphone.
"Thank you so much. Thank you for all the love. I'm here tonight to celebrate a very important birthday, the 25th day of remembrance of the VMAs. This is the 2008 MTV Video Music Awards and it starts right now."
And that was it. While MTV had said Spears would not be telling, it had promised a fun surprise.
The audience barely had time to digest her pro forma delivery earlier R&B singer Rihanna belted out the show's offset musical performance.
Spears did return to the stage a few minutes later to accept the first prize of the night, best female picture for her tune Piece Of Me.
It also delineate the outset MTV "Moonman" statuette of her career.
She thanked God, her home and dedicated the award to her fans. Spears is too in contention for video recording of the year and best pop video, both also for Piece of Me, which stalled at No. 18 on Billboard's Hot one C singles chart earlier this year.
Spears inadvertently stole the show last year. Clearly unsteady and out-of-shape, she badly lip-synched to a song, drawing bewildered stares from the high-wattage consultation and universal derision in the mussy aftermath.
But the tabloid target area seems to have avoided any calamities in late months. While she puts her life back together, her ex has total custody of their two sons, and her father and a lawyer suffer taken control of her business affairs.
The show was hosted by British comedian Russell Brand, who implored Americans to elect Democratic presidential campaigner Barack Obama.
Brand described US President George W Bush as a "retarded res publica fella ... In England, George Bush wouldn't be trusted with a pair of scissors".
Perhaps best known to mainstream audiences for his scene-stealing turn as a lovably sleazy rock headliner in the romantic comedy feature "Forgetting Sarah Marshall," Brand also ripped Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, and described the British royal family as "inbred nitwits".
The awards ar being held in Los Angeles for the first time in a tenner, on the historic studio apartment lot of MTV's corporate sibling, Paramount Pictures.
The lifestyle cable electronic network is exploitation the fake city streets, rooftops, and sound stages all over the Paramount lot to show diverse performances.
Besides Spears, other video of the year nominees are: R&B singer Chris Brown's Forever, teen idols the Jonas Brothers' Burnin' Up, girl group the Pussycat Dolls' When I Grow Up and English pop duette the Ting Tings' Shut Up and Let Me Go.
Last year, 7.1 million MTV viewers watched the festivities, according to Nielsen Media Research.
While viewership was up from 5.8 million the year before, the numbers were a far cry from the record 12 jillion viewers for the 1999 version.
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