Madonna is currently giving plenty of promo interviews where she talks about her upcoming Super Bowl performance, her latest movie W.E., her upcoming world tour, Lady Gaga and more…
Jacob Bernstein for The Daily Beast
She is sitting on a sofa in a posh midtown Manhattan hotel, wearing a blue silk dress and fingerless black leather gloves, and she has just been asked, perhaps for the 50th time today, how she began making her upcoming movie.
Not that question. Anything but that question. Ask me what you really want to know.
One of the interesting things about Madonna is that although she has been offending people throughout her entire career, she seems incapable of being offended by anything – except stuff that bores her.
The duchess appeals to Madonna’s inner drag queen-her fascination with a particular subset of iconic women, from Marilyn Monroe to Marlene Dietrich to Eva Perón, whose eternal celebrity personas inhabit all manner of sexual territory.
When I was making my Sex book. I wasn’t thinking about my kids or the reaction they would have. Now I have children, so I have to think about how things like that would impact them.
Touring has become the bulk of Madonna’s business (the last tour grossed $408 million, the most ever for a solo artist) since the music industry went belly up and consumers stopped buying records.
She’s not ready to talk about specific plans for this go-round, but it’s safe to assume that her ticket prices will continue to be astronomically expensive, Great Recession be damned.
So start saving your pennies now. People spend $300 on crazy things all the time, things like handbags. So work all year, scrape the money together, and come to my show. I’m worth it.
When asked about Lady Gaga’s “Born this Way”…
Of course I heard it. How could I not? I think it was on the radio a few times. I thought, ‘This is a wonderful way to redo my song.’ I recognized the chord changes, I thought it was … interesting
And at this, she gives a little smile.
Read the full article at The Daily Beast
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Rob Shuter for Naughty But Nice
The legendary Madonna tells Rob how she’s vying for Eli Manning’s position. Watch Naughty But Nice Thursdays at 8:00 PM ET on HDNet.
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David Noh for Film Journal
I brought up the intriguing fact that Madonna bought Ashcombe, the country home belonging to Cecil Beaton, who famously photographed the Windsors on their wedding day.
Yes, that’s another strange connection, believe it or not. Also, in London, my house is right around the corner from Bryanston Court, where she lived with Ernest [Simpson, her former husband], so I used to wander around and loiter and hang around that building. In my film, when Wallis Simpson says, “Get a life” and slams the door, that’s literally around the corner. I used to hang around there like some strange stalker, trying to imagine the Prince’s mobile driving up and parking out there for his six o’clock cocktail and what that all must have all been like.
Asked if she was nervous about the film’s reception, Madonna confides…
Well, perhaps I was when I went to the Venice Film Festival. But it’s been at many festivals now: Venice, Toronto, London, and I had a screening at MoMA. A lot of people have seen it and written about it, although I have not read anything anyone’s written, so I’m not really thinking so much about nervousness. I think people will like it or not like it.
Madonna wrote a song, “Masterpiece,” which she sings over W.E.’s closing credits. Asked if she plans to maybe sing it during her upcoming Super Bowl appearance, which coincides with her film’s general release date, she hesitates…
Um, maybe, I don’t know. I’m thinking about all the songs I’m going to perform and haven’t really made my final decision. Oh God, I’m so nervous. That I’m really nervous about. Eight minutes to set up the stage, twelve minutes to make the most amazing performance, and then ten minutes to take it down. The pressure!
Read the full article at Film Journal
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Chris Azzopardi for PrideSource
Seated with Madonna at a Waldorf-Astoria suite in New York City on a December afternoon, one writer tells her he has a question to kick off the interview. “I’m sure you do,” she quips all-knowingly, as if to acknowledge the fact that she’s aware how much gay men go gaga over her. This is, after all, the room reserved for a small group of gay press, her first stop after a tardy arrival – “It’s all too much. That’s why I’m late! I’m late for everything now.” – and the one her longtime publicist, Liz Rosenberg, insists will put her in a good mood for the rest of the day. Madonna agrees, sighing: “Let’s start with levity.”
What similarities do you see between Wallis and Evita?
What they have in common is what many people have in common who are public figures, who become iconic and who have some kind of historical impact, especially women – strong women. People have a tendency to feel intimidated by the strength of these women, and in order to accept – actually, the word “accept” is wrong, because I don’t think they’re actually accepted. I think in order to deal with them, a lot of people who write history books, and humanity in general, has a tendency to diminish women or undermine their accomplishments or try to portray them as heretical or as someone with an evil possession of some kind of sorcery, or undermine their strength or intelligence, so I think they have those things in common. Now I’m not saying that Eva Peron is without flaws or that Wallis Simpson was this perfect holy human being, but I do think they were both dealt with in a very unfair way in the history books.
Have you felt that way?
(Laughs, expecting the question) Well, yeah, sure. Yes, of course. I mean, I don’t think it’s just me. It’s strong women in general.
Why?
Why? Because… (hesitates)
You’re a threat?
No. It’s just the nature of the universe. It’s the nature of the world that we live in. We live in a patriarchal society and strong women have to…
Challenge that?
No. They’re held under a microscope and judged and measured in a different way. That’s just the law of the universe right now.
Growing up, you rebelled against your upbringing and convention, becoming a major trailblazer. How is it different being a mother with kids who will not have to fight the same battles that you fought?
Not that this has anything to do with my film, but it’s an interesting question. I don’t think that I’m a conventional parent. I realize that, to a certain extent, my children are raised with privilege; they have housekeepers, I didn’t. There are a lot of differences. On the other hand, my parents raised me in a very conventional way and I rebelled against it, and now my children come to me and they often want to do things because everybody else does them, and I say to them, “That’s just the worst reason I’ve ever heard for doing something.”
I encourage them to question things. Question their behavior, take responsibility for their behavior, think outside the box. And they will have a different set of challenges. They will be compared to me. I will be some kind of a benchmark that they have to live with and deal with, and they are going to have to find their way in the world. We are all born with, and into, our challenges, so I don’t think for a second that life is going to be so simple and easy for them.
Read the full interview at PrideSource
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