Timbaland, who recently said in an interview that Justin Timberlake should have "put a muzzle" on his ex Britney Spears, has now apologized for his remarks.
In a live interview with 9th Wonder at the Kennedy Center late last month, Timbaland's response when asked about his renewed interest toward the song "Cry Me a River" following the release of Spears' memoir was, "She going crazy, right? I wanted to call JT, 'Man, you gotta put a muzzle on that girl.'"
He added, "But you know what? We live in an age of social media and everybody wanna go viral. I get it, because that's the way you make money. Go viral."
As he met with severe backlash online for his comments, Timbaland went live on TikTok on Thursday (November 9) to offer an apology.
"I'm sorry to all the Britney fans, even to her," he said in the video. "I'm sorry, because muzzle was—no, you have a voice. You speak what you want to speak. Who am I to tell you what not to speak? And I was wrong for saying that. I was looking at it from a different lens and what I am is a reconcile person. I'm not a person who takes sides… I apologize to the Britney fans and her."
In her memoir, The Woman in Me, Spears wrote that the music video for "Cry Me a River" painted her as a villain after the fallout of her extremely public relationship with Justin. The video featured Timberlake with an unfaithful girlfriend who looked somewhat like Spears, leading people to suggest she cheated on him. She wrote that the video turned her into a "harlot who'd broken the heart of America's golden boy."
While he was casting a lookalike in the video and "happily running around Hollywood," she noted, she was "comatose in Louisiana."
(Photo: Randee St. Nicholas)
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