Ginuwine has addressed Britney Spears’ now-viral story about Justin Timberlakeputting on a Black accent when he first met the R&B star.
The “Pony” singer, who has been appearing on The Masked Singer, spoke with PEOPLE about the alleged encounter.
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Ginuwine confessed: “Yeah, yeah, I definitely heard about it. People were calling about that. But I can tell you I don’t remember that happening. I truly don’t remember that happening.”
He added: “If Justin would’ve did something like that, I probably would’ve looked at him like, ‘Why are you acting like that?’ If he did that, that would be something that I would remember. That would’ve definitely stuck out. So nah, I don’t remember that happening.”
In her memoir, The Woman In Me, Britney Spears recalls a moment where she and her then-boyfriend Justin Timberlake met Ginuwine in New York.
“His band NSYNC was what people called back then ‘so pimp,’” she wrote. “They were white boys but they loved Hip Hop. To me, that’s what separated them from the Backstreet Boys, who seemed very consciously to position themselves as a white group. NSYNC hung out with Black artists.”
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She continued: “Sometimes, I think they tried too hard to fit in. One day, J and I were in New York going to parts of town I’d never been to before. Walking our way was a guy with a huge blinged-out medallion. He was flanked by two giant security guards. J got all excited and said so loud, ‘Oh yeah, fo shizz, fo shizz. Ginuwine! What’s up, homie?’
“After Ginuwine walked away, Felicia [Britney’s former assistant] did an impression of J. ‘Oh yeah, fo shizz, fo shizz. Ginuwine!’ J wasn’t even embarrassed. He just took it and looked at her like, ‘Okay, fuck you, Felicia.’”
The audiobook clip of the excerpt went viral on social media due to its narration by Oscar-winning actress Michelle Williams, who attempted an impression of Timberlake and his alleged “blaccent.”
Timberlake has yet to publicly addresse the alleged incident nor any of the other claims made about him in Spears’ book, including details relating to an abortion the pop star had during their relationship.
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Timberlake was recently defended by Xscape singer Kandi Burruss over Spears’ claims he put on a “blaccent.”
Last month, she said: “I don’t want anybody to, like, down Justin because you’ve got to remember the times that we were going through at the time. That era of pop and R&B, it was a lot of boy bands that did, like, urban music, urban routines and dancing, the whole image. That was in at the time, and nobody was passing judgment.”
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She continued: “I just feel like that was young Justin. Leave him alone, y’all. He was a really, really good guy.”
