Madonna (22 page)

In a matter of six months Madonna had gone from a hopeful singer with a couple of dance hits under her belt to the fastest-rising female singing star in the world. She had never been on a real concert tour in her life, and she certainly had never had to carry a seventy-minute stage show on her voice alone. Thanks to records and videos, Madonna was one of the hottest stars of 1985; she had become front page news largely due to her performances in videos, and now—thanks to
Desperately Seeking Susan
—on the silver screen. But the unanswered question remained: “Can she really sing?” Or, better yet: “Can she sing AND dance at the same time?” A couple of “track dates” at Paradise Garage and lip-syncing to a recording during a video session do not a concert performer make. Could she really deliver the goods?

When the Virgin Tour opened on April 10, 1985, in Seattle, Washington, all eyes were on Madonna. Much to everyone's surprise, she pulled it off with ease. Her voice was a little shrill at times, and her choreography was mainly an assemblage of classic sixties dances and spins. However, the fact remained: Madonna kicked ass onstage. On “Gambler” she rock-and-rolled in a league with the best of them. “Like a Virgin” and “Material Girl” were served up like musical theater. The show included all of Madonna's hits from “Holiday” to “Crazy for You.” Naturally, there were some suggestive segments. When it came time to perform “Everybody,” she brought out a large portable radio, commonly known as “a ghetto blaster” or “a box.” Straddling the musical appliance, Madonna turned to the crowd and said, “Every lady has a box. But mine makes music.”
¹⁰⁸
Roll over Mae West.

During the finale of “Material Girl,” Madonna picked each of the band members' pockets to amass a collection of baubles, bangles, and beads. She also tossed the crowd specially printed “Material Girl” stage money, with Madonna's picture in the center of the bill!

As she left the stage each night after “Material Girl,” a paternal male voice was heard over the loudspeakers, shouting with disapproval, “Madonna, get down off that stage this instant,” to which Madonna's reply was a prerecorded “Daddy, do I hafta?”
¹⁰⁸
It was reminiscent of what Tony Ciccone would have liked to have said to his daughter when she was doing her Goldie Hawn go-go routine in elementary school years ago. When the show rolled into Detroit, the real Tony Ciccone made a guest appearance when he dragged Madonna into the wings while the prerecorded finale message played.

When the show toured America, the critics' reviews were mixed, but tickets sold out across the board.
MADONNA SEDUCES SEATTLE
glowed
Rolling Stone;
MADONNA ROCKS THE LAND
claimed
Time
magazine; and
IT'S MADONNA MAGIC
! cheered the
New York Post
. However,
The Hollywood Reporter
blasted her, claiming, “Madonna came across more like a cross between Charo and Wayne Newton than a latter-day Gina Lollobrigida/Marilyn Monroe—type. But at least Charo can play her own guitar. Rumors that the Virgin could dance proved to be, for the most part, completely unfounded.”
¹⁰⁹

Madonna's Virgin Tour wasn't necessarily aimed at the critics. The people who liked her were the young “wannabes” the tour was geared for.

“The people who loathed me didn't get it, and my success pissed them off. I think it would be kind of boring if everyone really just loved me a hundred percent.”
²⁶

Madonna was really quite flattered by the dress-alike “wannabes” who came to the concert in lace gloves, crucifixes, torn leggings, and rags tied in their hair. Never were there so many pubescent smiles showing equal amounts of ruby red lipstick and brace-covered teeth as there were displayed on her tour that summer. It was like Halloween without the pumpkins and candy.

Quick to cash in on a trend, Madonna signed a merchandising deal with a clothing manufacturer called Entertainers Merchandise Management Corp. The manufacturer then marketed the official Boy Toy clothes under the name of Wazoo fashions. In turn, Wazoo distributed official Madonna clothes to department stores across the country, including Bullock's in California, Macy's in New York, and Merry-Go-Round stores in shopping malls across the land. Hot items that the Wazoo line featured included a knee-length roll-waistband skirt ($30), a “Boy Toy crop top” for displaying your navel ($26), and Madonna “Like a Virgin” T-shirts ($14).

When Madonna rolled into New York City, the Herald Square flagship store of the Macy's chain opened its “Madonna Department” in the heart of its junior fashion floor. You could also purchase Maripol's Catholic “voodoo” jewelry and listen to nonstop Madonna tunes in the official Madonna section of the store. According to Maripol, “Not everybody can afford gold or pearls, but everybody can buy a package of twelve rubber bracelets for five dollars!”
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Lisa Engler, who was the merchandise manager for Bullock's in Los Angeles, said at the time, “Whatever Madonna was wearing, they'd wear. She's that strong an influence.”
¹¹⁰

To really work the press, the Madonna department at Macy's held a Madonna look-alike contest on Thursday, June 6, the day she opened at Radio City Music Hall. Andy Warhol, who was the celebrity judge of the contest, commented that he was amazed by the amount of money the girls spent to mirror Madonna's fashions and makeup.

Unlike other concert acts, the crowd that Madonna's Virgin Tour drew was primarily teenage girls, dressed up like their idol. In fact, ticket sellers confirmed that the audiences at her shows were 60 percent female. According to Jerry Seltzer, executive vice president at Ticket-master in Los Angeles, “The demand was unbelievable. We could've sold 100,000 tickets if we had them.”
¹¹¹

It was Freddy DeMann's decision that Madonna would play at smaller venues across the country—like Radio City Music Hall in New York, and the Universal Amphitheatre in L.A. “This is Madonna's first tour,” he said while tickets were selling like hotcakes, “and we wanted to start conservatively. If I had known what I know now, we'd have done three nights at the [Los Angeles] Forum!”
¹¹¹

There was an opening act on the Virgin Tour, but their inclusion on the bill was a mere formality, as they were totally eclipsed by Madonna's blinding presence. They were the Beastie Boys, and their set was barely tolerable enough to sit through.

If you're the headliner, the unofficial rock concert rule is never to have an opening act with more talent or more hits than you. Madonna personally took care of that situation when she called Russell Simmons, manager for the white rap trio, and inquired whether the Beastie Boys were interested in opening for her. Their songs about drinking beer and “getting laid” must have seemed like a great smoke screen of an opening act for her. They were moderately popular, but basically rude and musically untalented. After their set, the crowd would impatiently clamor for Her Virginness to hit the stage. Even if she dry-humped anything during her set—like she had on the MTV Awards telecast—she'd still come across as ultra-talented by comparison.

Needless to say, this was the Beasties' big break, and they jumped at the opportunity. Opening for Madonna was to be their biggest claim to fame as performers. Reviewing their act on the tour,
Time
called it “a forgettable 30 minutes by a raunchy rap band.”
²
The group later produced a Number One album, 1987's
Licensed to III
. When they embarked on a tour to support the album, they were less than popular with parents across the land. Their troubles stemmed not only from their lewd lyrics but also from the twenty-foot-tall pink penis that was one of their stage props and for coercing young girls in the audience to bare their breasts.

From April 10 to June 8 the Virgin Tour wound its way from one excited venue to the next. Wasting no time, Madonna had gone directly from dance club and lip-sync video phenomenon to full-fledged rock star almost instantly. Thanks to her own aggressiveness, and the top notch manager she snagged, Madonna was officially rated as having attained “superstar” status.

On May 15, Madonna played the Pontiac, Michigan, Silverdome stadium. The massive complex is just off Featherstone Road, near the house she grew up in. Her father, her family, and even her grandmother came to see little Nonnie's triumphant return to her hometown.

In the middle of the song “Holiday,” Madonna stopped to talk to her audience. That night at the Silverdome she received a thunderous round of applause and had to bury her eyes in her hands to hold back the tears. Facing the cheering crowd—literally in her old neighborhood—she said, “I was never elected the homecoming queen or anything, but I sure feel like one now.”
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When 17,622 tickets went on sale for Madonna's three scheduled concert performances at Radio City Music Hall, they sold out in thirty-four minutes—setting a new house record. The demand for Madonna tickets in the Big Apple reached such proportions that two dates at the 18,000-seat Madison Square Garden had to be added to the tour, June 10 and 11. Madonna said from the stage at the Garden: “I used to look at the Garden and say, I wonder if I'll ever get in there?”
¹¹²
She had come a long way from those days.

To welcome her back to Manhattan, a massive party was held on June 11 at the Palladium. For $15, patrons could party with Madonna, or at least try to catch a glimpse of her. Only blocks away from the Palladium was the grimy East Village digs that she once called home. Her entire life had since changed dramatically. Instead of having people in the neighborhood chasing her for her late rent, they now chased her for autographs.

When she began her two-month concert tour, Sean Penn had been in the middle of production meetings regarding his forthcoming film,
At Close Range
, co-starring Christopher Walken. When Madonna's tour opened in Seattle, Sean flew in from New York to catch her concert debut. When she played Detroit, Sean also flew in to see her show and to meet her parents for the first time.

An interesting note: When Madonna played Los Angeles, one of the people who attended her concert was Jellybean Benitez. The gossip columnists were quick to mention that he watched the show with fascination but made no attempts to visit his former girlfriend backstage.

The night before she opened at Radio City, Madonna attempted to hang out at the massive Palladium discotheque on Fourteenth Street incognito. It didn't quite work out. With a cap pulled down over her eyes, and in the company of nine male friends, she was still recognized by the paparazzi. When photographer Felice Quinto of the Associated Press attempted to take shots of Madonna, the singer's bodyguards threatened to break her cameras. Quinto managed to get a few shots in, which ran on the cover of the
New York Post
under the headline
MADONNA'S DISCO FLAP
. It was as though she had surpassed the mere moniker of “star” and ascended to the role of “media goddess.” Suddenly Madonna's every move was considered front page news.

It was June 1985 and Madonna was the reigning queen of rock and roll. Her last six singles all hit the Top Ten, her
Like a Virgin
album had sold over 4.5 million copies in America and another 2.5 million abroad. Her first professional acting role in a major film yielded a certified box office hit. She was being discussed for her first starring vehicle. Besides a biopic on Libby Holman, another on fifties stripper Blaze Stan-were both bantered about. And, to top it all off, she was being romantically pursued by a movie star. How much more perfect could life be?

For the past six months, America—and the rest of the world—had been bombarded by Madonna. Wherever you turned, you were confronted by Madonna's name, her likeness, or her voice. Madonna was suddenly the “It” girl of the eighties. Not only was this an accomplishment worthy of celebration, but Madonna called her own shots.

At first it seemed like Madonna controlled the media. She knew when to manipulate it and how to cause a stir. Her objective was to shock the press, and she never failed to deliver. She knew just how far to push comments for shock value, without offending
everyone
. She knew how to be scandalous in a titillating fashion, and her brashness somehow made her seem enticing. While she was an easy target for critics, she emerged unscathed. Caustic comments about her aggressive behavior and her less-than-virginal displays just seemed to roll off her.

In addition to the press coverage, move for move her career was proceeding brilliantly. She had so far triumphed in every arena she entered: records, videos, movies, and now live concerts. No one could deny that she was masterfully succeeding at the game of fame, that she had hit nothing but home runs so far. Little did she suspect, but she was about to be thrown her first couple of curve balls.

I used to go out with graffiti writers…

but I really last the jest for writing my

name everywhere. Now I have suitors

that do it for me.
¹⁹
—Madonna

 

B
efore her Virgin Tour even started, Madonna had already selected a condo in Los Angeles and planned to spend the majority of her time there. She still maintained her New York loft on Bleecker Street, but she was now ready to conquer Hollywood. The vast majority of the time she had spent in New York had been as a struggling unknown. But when Madonna arrived in Los Angeles, she was not only a star, she was also a much sought after fresh face in town.

Because of her recording successes she had become a red hot singing sensation. But with the added dimension of having scored a huge success in
Desperately Seeking Susan
, Hollywood welcomed her with open arms.