Britney Spears performs in a gilded cage on the opening night of her Circus concert series on March 3 in New Orleans

Singer admonishes crowd for alleged pot smoking

By Matthew B. Zeidman

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Hollywood Today) 4/9/09 – Britney Spears, who raised controversy when she was first photographed smoking in 2002, stopped mid-concert for half-an-hour on Wednesday when concertgoers’ smoke overwhelmed members of her crew.

According to the Associated Press, an announcer asked members of the crowd to extinguish their cigarettes so that the performance at Vancouver’s General Motors Place, which had gone on for only 15 minutes, could continue. When Spears finally returned to the stage, she admonished the crowd, stating, “Don’t smoke weed,” AP reported.

While it was unclear if it was cigarette or marijuana smoke that caused the problem, a rep for Spears released a statement confirming that “crew members above the stage” fell ill due to poor ventilation.

Spears, 27, is in the midst of her international Circus tour, her first major performance series since 2004’s Onyx Hotel Tour, which was cut in half when the singer seriously injured her knee during a music video shoot.