Madonna (55 page)

In January 1997 the nominations for the Golden Globe Awards, presented annually by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, were announced. Miracle of miracles—after years of dreadful movies, and only an occasional flash of cinematic brilliance, Madonna was nominated as Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy for her performance in
Evita
. That distinction alone was worth all of the effort she had invested, beginning with her unflagging campaign for the role. When she actually won the award, it was a diamond in her crown of achievements.

As usual, the Academy Awards were a whole other story. Since the Foreign Press Association nominated five actresses for drama and five actresses for musical or comedy, the potential field of nominees was immediately cut in half. And since most of the old-guard Hollywood royalty—who still make up the bulk of Academy voters—viewed Madonna as less than a class act, she and
Evita
were roundly snubbed in the major categories. The one shining moment of the telecast came when “You Must Love Me” won the Academy Award for best song. Naturally, Madonna performed the song on the awards telecast, so it was almost like getting an Academy Award for her performance of it. Of course, the award really went to the songwriters, Webber and Rice.

After the Academy Awards nominations had been announced, writer Bruce Handy penned an article in the February 24, 1997, issue of
Time
magazine entitled “Crying For Madonna, Experts Explain Why Oscar Snubbed the Studios,” in which he surveyed the choices that the Academy had made that year. Handy interviewed several industry insiders, identified by occupation alone. The dialogue that appeared included: “Publicist: ‘There was Madonna backlash and maybe Andrew Lloyd Webber backlash—and the movie was horrible. This is the second year in a row that the Golden Globe—winning actress—last year it was Nicole Kidman—didn't even get a nomination.' Former studio head: ‘I don't think there was a backlash. If anything, I think there was sympathy for the movie. It took a lot of guts to make an all-out musical.' “ (274)

Amid the
Evita
media whirl, Madonna was at her most contained and least controversial. One of her appearances was the 1997 TV special
Happy Birthday Elizabeth: A Celebration of Life
, commemorating Elizabeth Taylor's birthday. It was Taylor's last performance before undergoing brain surgery, so it was an emotion-filled, concert-type event, with Elizabeth in the front row of the audience being honored in song and with comedy acts.

Clearly, the spirit of Eva Peron, and her channeling of it on screen, had somehow changed Madonna and her outlook on life:
“Evita
gave me time off from being me. And so it was a really great relief. It gave me a whole new perspective on everything. I just stopped feeling sorry for myself.” (258)

Suddenly, Madonna desired to make more meaningful statements than she had at the beginning of the 1990s. If there had been any message associated with her
Erotica
era, it would have been have sex with anyone or anything if it feels good. Now, between
Evita
and motherhood, she started seeking more substance.

Three years shy of the dawn of the new millennium, publications were already logging exhaustive lists of the century's best in various fields. There was no question that Madonna's name would be bantered about in one way or another. In its May 15, 1997, issue,
Rolling Stone
magazine named
Like a Prayer
one of the “200 Best Albums Ever Made.”

The year 1997 was truly one of bizarre occurrences, and the second half of it seemed to be a particularly rough one for celebrities. In July 1997 fashion designer Gianni Versace was murdered outside of his Miami home by a psychopath who committed suicide before the police found him. Having frequently worn his designs, Madonna was crushed when she found out about Versace's death.

The most symbolically tragic event of the 1990s was undoubtedly the sudden death of Princess Diana of Wales in August 1997. Only days later, when Madonna was on stage in Radio City Music Hall as a presenter for the annual
MTV Video Music Awards
, she condemned the paparazzi photographers of the world, whom it seemed had caused the death of Princess Diana. This sentiment was indicative of her new and more serious life stance.

Indeed, Diana's death had caused press photographers to stop and reevaluate their insane quest for the perfect shot. According to Madonna at the time, “Since Princess Diana's death, I have to say I've had a lot more freedom. I spent two weeks in New York right after it happened and I haven't had so much freedom in, like, ten years. I went to the park almost every day with my daughter and pushed her in a stroller and nobody bothered me. And I was in shock. Except for one day, I never saw paparazzi.” (250)

Madonna also had a new way of looking at herself and her career: “The act of writing music or singing it or performing is much more exciting than trying to be beautiful. Ever since my daughter was born, I feel the fleetingness of time. And I don't want to waste it on getting the perfect lip color.” (250)

She credited much of her shift in outlook to Lourdes: “I think [motherhood] made me face up to my more feminine side. I had a much more masculine view of the world. What I missed and longed for was that unconditional love that a mother gives you. And so, having my daughter is the same kind of thing. It's like that first, true, pure, unconditional love. It is the first time it has happened to me that I am aware of. The love you get from your father isn't the same.” (258)

Motherhood also changed her circle of friends. “I do have a close set of women friends now,” she announced in
Rolling Stone
magazine in 1997. “I'm much closer to women who have children now; I'm drawn to them. Being surrounded by good friends always helped. But having my daughter helps me deal with [the celebrity spotlight], because everything else pales in comparison anyway.” (250)

By now, Carlos Leon was out of her life, with the exception of unlimited visitation rights to their daughter. As far as a future with him, apparently he was not “Y2K-compliant.”

All kinds of news items about Madonna having found religion were circulating during this era, including the bizarre announcement that she was studying the Kabbalah, an ancient form of Judaism. “It is not about religion. It is sort of a manual for living,” Madonna explained. “It has nothing to do with dogma. It is the mystical interpretation of the Old Testament. How has it changed me? It's helped me stand up and take responsibility for everything to do with me. To stop saying, ‘You did this to me,' or ‘They did this to me. It is their fault.' It has taught me to take responsibility and look at everything that is happening to me and be grateful for even the painful things.” (258)

Another major change in her life involved her former fitness-freak exercise-and-jogging routines. Pumping iron was out, yoga was in. “I guess everybody associates me with this incredible sort of workout ethic,” she explained. “Well, I used to do that. I am here to say it is a huge waste of time. I didn't have to push myself so hard, and I didn't know it…. I was hooking into aggression. Now, with yoga, I have to look inside and deal with the stillness.” (258) Obviously, her self-imposed maternity leave had wrought several major changes in her life. “Now that I've had the baby, I feel liberated in a sense. I don't feel I have to be a certain size or have perfect abs. I still exercise, but I don't care as much.” (252)

In the March 1998
Vanity Fair
, Madonna unveiled little Lourdes in an exclusive photo shoot. Also in March, she was set to release her latest album,
Ray of Light
Coincidence? Or typically careful planning from Madonna Command Central?

On January 23, several weeks before the official release of
Ray of Light
, the Singapore Madonna Link, an unauthorized web site, allowed Internet explorers to download a preview of the song “Frozen.” The site reportedly received 140,000 hits in three weeks. A press controversy exploded over this issue: Was it an act of piracy, or a planned publicity stunt? Either way, the Madonna frenzy was in full swing.

On February 14, 1998, Madonna showed up at the Roxy, a dance club/roller disco on West 18th Street in Manhattan, at 2:00
A.M
. to debut three songs from her forthcoming
Ray of Light
album. Reviewing the performance, her first live concert in four years,
Rolling Stone
magazine condescendingly described her performance: “Dress globally, talk snob-bily, sing wobbly.” (275)

Upon its release, many critics felt that
Ray of Light
was truly a case of Madonna Light, similar to what the Beatles
Magical Mystery Tour
was to their career.

Explaining her new awareness to
The New York Times
, she said, “As my body was opening up and I was going into places that had been locked for so many years, it was releasing emotional things. I'd be lying in
sivasana
[a prone corpse-like position] and I'd be weeping. Or I'd do a forward bend and tears would come to my eyes. I'd sort of get embarrassed and think, “Why is this happening to me? But I realized that I was going through a catharsis.” (276)

She even admitted that her established audience might not be ready for this sudden mood swing:

She told
Billboard
magazine: “This album is reflective of where I am in my life right now—in terms of my musical interests and in terms of my personal beliefs. I feel like I've been enlightened, and that it's my responsibility to share what I've learned so far with the world.” (277)

For a two-week period, you couldn't walk into a bar in Manhattan without overhearing someone asking, “Have you heard the new Madonna album? Do you like it?” Critics didn't take so long to make up their minds.
Rolling Stone
, seriously questioning her musical choices, stated, “Frankly,
Ray of Light
could have been a lot more fun…. Madonna's prayers and sermons, heavy with Indo-Hollywood spirituality and new motherhood, are serious verging on severe.” (275)

Ann Powers, coeditor of
Rock She Wrote
, pondered in
The New York Times
,

Time's
Christopher John Farley claimed, “Unlike some of Madonna's previous hot and sexy albums, this one is resolutely frigid—if you licked this album, your tongue would stick to it.… However, the contrast between the chilly surface and the confessional nature of many of the lyrics creates a tension, even a passion.” (278)

Billboard
reported, “Much has already been made of the pop chameleon's foray into electronica, and it deserves every prerelease accolade it's gotten—and them some. Easily her most mature and personal work to date,
Ray of Light
finds Madonna weaving lyrics with the painstaking intimacy of diary entries…. A deliciously adventurous, ultimately victorious effort from one of pop music's most compelling performers.” (279)

Some of the tracks were more musical melodies with electronic touches on which her poems of ponderance floated. As she explained, “I had been listening to a lot of electronica and trance music. It was just this blank canvas, a mood thing. It occurred to me that you could take it to another level by actually investing it with emotion.” (276)

“I've been a fan of all kinds of electronic music for many years, and I wanted to incorporate that sound into my music,” she stated at the time. Like her creative collaboration on
Bedtime Stories
, she aligned herself with a producer/writer who excelled at this new wave of 1990s music. She found the perfect partner for this project in William Orbit. “I love the haunting, trance-like quality of his records,” she said. “I've also found something melancholy about his music. Since I'm attracted to that sound, and since I tend to write a lot of sad songs, we seemed like a good match.” (277)

Their creative colloboration began with Orbit handing her a tape with five different instrumental tracks. “It basically was a sketchbook of fantastic ideas. Every track was so inspiring. I took them and gave them structure,” she explains. (277)

One of them, “Swim,” about the consequences of bad karma, really touched her. “It gave me shivers the first time I heard it. We both knew we were onto something special.” (277)

The thirteen-track album begins with the song ‘Drowned World/Substitute for Love.” The song starts with Madonna announcing that she has “traded fame for love.” As if that announcement isn't jarring enough, a careful examination of the album liner notes reveals that the song samples excerpts from a Rod McKuen/Anita Kerr composition called “Why I Follow the Tigers.” Madonna sampling Rod McKuen? What is the world coming to?

The song ponders the hollowness of fame, but in many ways could easily be interpreted as singing about embracing film. In the song she renounces handsome strangers, ferris wheel rides, and artificial drugs for what she has now found. Indeed, there is a new Madonna for premillen-nium spiritual seekers.