Criss Angel is laughing off reports that he’s nailing Britney Spears. The womanizing magician maintains he’s working with the pop tart on her upcoming opening performance at the MTV Video Music Awards.

Criss tells Parade.com, “She (Spears) had contacted me regarding some live performances. I’ve designed and created many effects for shows… That’s what I do. So they brought me on to discuss the possibility of working on some stuff with her. And, being that I’m insanely busy, the only time that I had was in the evening. She was busy doing stuff, so we met in the evening. What you failed to see is, when we meet, there’s a lot of other people around a bunch of the time. So it’s just the way it’s presented.”