It's been three years since a shapely teenager from a small town in Louisiana donned a scanty schoolgirl uniform, wiggled her bare midriff and crooned herself into international celebrity.

She has become so famous, in fact, that those promoting her in a recent music-television documentary claim she has taken her place alongside such entertainment icons as Elvis and Madonna - stars who need only a first name to be recognized.

Britney ...

Spears (for those not in the know) set young girls - and old men - on their heads when she first exploded onto the pop culture scene in her 1999 music video for her smash debut single, "... (Hit Me) Baby One More Time," clad as a half-dressed Catholic-school student.

Since then, 20-year-old Britney - recently the most-searched subject on the Internet - has attained a kind of extra-celestial stardom, selling millions upon millions of albums, appearing before raucous sold-out audiences all across the world and even starring in her own feature film, the critically abhorred "Crossroads."

But all that might be changing.

If ticket sales Saturday for her July Fourth weekend concert on the Atlantic City Boardwalk serve as any kind of indication, Britney Spears' star might be fading.

Ticketmaster representatives across the region reported sluggish demand on the first day of ticket sales for Spears' third Atlantic City concert, to be held July 5 at Boardwalk Hall.

There was no one camping out. No long lines. No phones ringing off the hook.

Just business as usual.

Outside the box office at Boardwalk Hall, only about a dozen fans stood waiting for tickets to go on sale at 10 a.m.

A ticket saleswoman inside who wished not to be identified said later in the day that business had been no brisker than on an average day. She estimated only about a hundred or so tickets had been sold there by late afternoon. By noon, the box office was empty.

At the Ticketmaster outlet inside Boscov's department store in Egg Harbor Township Saturday morning, the scene was similar. From 11 a.m. until noon, only one person - Linda Vassallo of Margate - purchased tickets for the show.

Vassallo bought two tickets, one for her 15-year-old daughter, "who really likes" Spears, and one for her 11-year-old daughter, "who loves her." Still, she was unwilling to pay more than the $40 per ticket price of the least-expensive seats.

"I'll take the $40 ones," she told the clerk after he ran through the ticket prices, which stretch from a low of $40 to a high of $100. "What am I stupid?" she joked. "It's Britney Spears."

After making her purchase, Vassallo - who said she too is a fan of Spears; "She's adorable," she said - said she was surprised that so few fans had showed up to buy tickets.

"Her luster does seem like it wore out," she said. "I thought for sure the concert would be sold out by now."

Saturday's ticket sales - or lack thereof - are quite a different story from when Spears made her first Atlantic City appearance, in August 2000. That year, Spears held the distinction of hosting the only concert at the Taj Mahal's 6,000-seat arena that sold out on the same day tickets went on sale.

But even if the lackluster ticket sales are indicative of Spears' impending decline, one thing seems clear: Britney's not going anywhere anytime soon.

For proof, one need only consider the fact that the news of Britney's alleged break-up with boy-band front man Justin Timberlake - of 'NSYNC lore - last month made international headlines, showing up on cable news networks and in reputable newspapers across the world. (For the record, both Spears and Timberlake have denied the reports.)

And back at Boscov's Saturday, two people - a middle-aged man and woman - waiting in line to buy tickets for another Atlantic City act couldn't resist adding their two cents.

"That Britney is something," the woman told the man. "She really threw that Justin Timberlake for a loop when they broke up. She made him crazy. He was just all broken-hearted. Poor guy.

"After they broke up, I heard he went on a shopping spree," she continued.

"Oh yeah?" the man asked.

"Yeah," she said. "He spent hundreds-of-thousands of dollars and was even running around with a bunch of strippers."

"Really?" the man asked.

"Yeah," she said. "I saw it on the news."

Source: pressofatlanticcity.com