It looks like Britney Spears is not not married.
With a report claiming the pop-tart's weekend wedding may have only been a ceremonial ceremony, the "Oops" singer and her husband say they are indeed hitched. For however long that lasts.
Spears, 22, and dancer Kevin Federline, 26, exchanged rings and vows on Saturday night at the Studio City, California, home of their wedding planner. Per reports, a minister presided.
That combo--vows and a member of the clergy--should have been enough to validate the Spears-Federline union.
"You're legally married the moment you say, 'I do,' " Claudia Monarrez, a supervisor at the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/Clerk's office, said Wednesday.
And that's the case, Monarrez said, even if the marriage license never gets filed. (California law, however, does require couples to file within 10 days of the ceremony, officials said.)
In the Oct. 4 issue of People, Federline said he and the spouse intended to file their license "next week."
The new Us Weekly disputes this happily wedded version of events. The magazine says it has documents--signed by Spears and Federline--in which the couple refers to the Sept. 18 wedding as "a 'faux' wedding" and refers to Oct. 16 as the day on which they really intend to wed.
Such a document could make what happened on Saturday essentially a fancy, but meaningless, event, vows or no.
"Our story is accurate, true, well-documented and air tight and verified by her own people," said Ken Baker, West Coast executive editor of Us Weekly.
There was no new word on the report from Spears' camp Wednesday. In Us, a rep for Spears calls the magazine's story "ludicrous." In People, Federline uses a choicer word.
"Basically, these reports that we didn't legally wed are [BS]," Federline told People.
Federline explained the delay in filing the license on a delay in finalizing the pre-nup--a pre-nup that was indeed finalized, he said.
"The details [of the pre-nup] aren't anyone's business," Federline said in People. "But it wasn't any big deal. However, after finishing, we were advised to wait a certain grace period before filing the license."
Kathy Treggs, manager of public records for L.A. County's Registrar-Recorder/Clerk's office, said there was no record there of a Spears-Federline marriage-license application. But that doesn't mean they don't have one, she said--public marriage licenses can be obtained by altar-bound California couples through any county in the state; confidential marriage licenses can be obtained via some 500 authorized notaries throughout Los Angeles County.
In the end, Treggs said, a judge is the final arbiter of whether one is married--or not.
"The validity of the license doesn't validate the marriage," Treggs said. "Only a court [can do that]."
Spears should be well-versed with legalese where marriage is concerned. Her first wedding--a quickie Las Vegas ceremony to childhood friend Jason Allen Alexander in January--ended 55 hours and one annulment later.
Saturday's ceremony, while having the appearance of another quickie ceremony, was planned right down to the post-wedding "Pimp" sweat suits worn by Federline and his groomsmen.
In People, Spears called the service "my fairy-tale dream."
In the magazine, the couple dished on every detail of their weekend, from their pre-wedding night--they stayed at the Fairmont Miramar Hotel, lit candles and played Phil Collins' greatest hits--to their actual wedding night--they stayed at the Hotel Bel-Air, lit candles and jumped into a bed covered with rose petals.
Said the gentleman Federline of his and Spears' first evening as a wedded couple: "It was great--all night."
Per Us, a revised draft of the couple's pre-nup, dated Sept. 17, stipulates that should the two ever split, Federline would be paid $300,000 a year for every two years they stay married. (Hollywood divorce math made simple: If they stay married, say, 10 years, Federline would receive five annual payments of $300,000.)
So far, it doesn't sound like Spears is thinking of cold-hard finances.
"I don't think we've woken up," the newlywed said in People. "It's like a dream."
(Originally published Sept. 22, 2004 at 1:35 p.m. PT)