Goddess: Inside Madonna Read online

  dedication

  For Gérard

  contents

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Don’t Cry for me, Argentina

  PART ONE

  Don’t Cry for me Argentina

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  PART TWO

  Who’s That Girl?

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  PART THREE

  Lucky Star

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  PART FOUR

  Material Girl

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  PART FIVE

  Blond Ambition

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Photo Section

  Epilogue

  Index

  Author’s Note

  Source Notes

  Also by Barbara Victor

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  acknowledgments

  One of the more unpleasant aspects of writing an unauthorized star biography is getting up every morning for more than a year with the realization that the majority of the people you want and need to talk to will do everything in their power to avoid you. It is a daunting challenge from the onset, and if the author is fortunate enough to find a few brave friends, business associates, and colleagues of the subject who are willing to speak on record, the rewards are great. And, if those friends, associates, and relatives speak out of admiration and affection, it is possible for the author to write a balanced portrait of the star and an impartial account of her life. As it concerns Goddess, while the bruises on my forehead remain from butting up against stone walls, I was also fortunate to have talked to many extraordinary and important people in Madonna’s life. Thanks to Tony and Joan Ciccone for their warmth and hospitality when I visited them at their vineyard. Thanks as well to Elsie Fortin, who left no doubt as to her loving feelings toward her most famous granddaughter. Thanks to Patrick Hernandez and Muriel Van Lieu, who received me at a difficult moment in their lives, immediately after the untimely death of Jean Van Lieu. Many of the people interviewed for this book, however, agreed to talk to me on the condition that I change their names or simply quote them without attribution, which, in these cases, I have done. My gratitude goes to everyone who was courageous and generous enough to spend time with me, those cited as well as those who asked to remain anonymous. In either case, their input, knowledge, and generosity are appreciated.

  I am also grateful to Carol Dickey for her invaluable help in organizing all the source and bibliography material; Tom Freeman and Mary Troath for their research on both sides of the Atlantic; Jacques Blache for sharing his knowledge about the music business; Boris Hoffman for all his kindness; Chris Dickey for his understanding about certain hostage situations; John Baxter for his unique humor about films and their stars; Mike Nolan for making Bay City a fun place to visit; the gang at HarperCollins, most especially Marjorie Braman and Leslie Engel. For my friends who are my family—Barbara Gordon, Dmitri Nabokov, Charlotte Rampling, Robert Nathan, Jean Noel Tassez, Thierry Billand, Heather Keller, Patrick Wajsman, Howard Schreiber, Brigitte Jessen, John Michel, and Danièle Mazengarbe—you all know how much I appreciate and value you. Also, thanks to Roberto Cerea and Franck de Paolo for all their understanding. My deep gratitude goes to Dov Zaidman.

  It is great having an editor who is smart and funny. I’ve been very lucky to have been able to work with Diane Reverand, my editor and my friend, who always “gets it” regardless of how inarticulate the words may sound. Thank you, Diane, for making everything seem so easy and for being so available and supportive. Thanks as well to Tom Wallace, who brought me back in so many ways. And, finally, to Gérard, who was solid throughout this project and who has finally admitted that he didn’t lose a wife as much as he gained an office during all my long absences across the Atlantic.

  It’s hard letting go but it’s even better moving on. . . .

  DON’T CRY FOR ME, ARGENTINA

  Despite all the adverse reaction to her presence in Buenos Aires, Madonna felt comfortable. On one occasion, a journalist from a local newspaper was allowed to watch one of her tango lessons. After it was over, the reporter approached her.

  “Do you get the impression that this is a macho society?” the journalist asked.

  Like a true ambassador of good will, Madonna answered without hesitating. “Women of Argentina are treated well because Eva Peron was the champion of women’s rights, and that’s something I can relate to.”

  “Eva Peron is often called a whore and an opportunist,” the journalist challenged the star.

  “Either she was called a saint or a prostitute,” Madonna replied, “which is what I am called by everyone, because of my name and because I’m in touch with my own sexuality. It’s the obvious way to put a woman down, to call her a whore and imply that she has no morals and no integrity and no talent. And God knows, I can relate to that, too.”

  Days later, when asked his impressions of Madonna, the journalist thought for a moment before saying, “She is fascinating because she is so self-involved. Everything is ‘me’ or ‘I’ or whatever she can ‘relate to’ based on her own life. In mind and soul, she embodies Eva Peron!”

  part one

  Don’t Cry for Me Argentina

  chapter one

  On October 13, 1995, Madonna landed at Heathrow Airport aboard a late-night Concorde under an assumed name. She was in London to begin working on the most crucial phase of production for the film Evita, a role that would prove to be her greatest screen success and one which she had coveted for more than ten years.

  Dressed in black with dark glasses covering her face, she walked hurriedly toward passport control. No advance publicity had signaled her arrival at Heathrow, and therefore no screaming public or photographers’ flashing lights greeted her. Only one lonely fan with a throwaway Kodak camera waited politely at the baggage-claim area. Madonna allowed him to snap several shots before she continued briskly on her way.

  Alan Parker, the director of Evita and most famous for his movie Fame, had summoned Madonna and her two leading men, Antonio Banderas, who was to play Che, and Jonathan Pryce, the British stage actor who would portray Juan Perón, to London to record the score for the film. The idea was that the three principal members of the cast would spend approximately four months recording different versions of the thirty-one songs, ranging from loud and dramatic to smaller and more restrained, before a single reel of film was shot. When they were finished, Parker would choose the rendition he liked best, and the one he would visualize when he was actually filming the corresponding scenes. It was an enormous challenge for Madonna since Evita, more than mere musical theater, was operatic in sound and style. She knew it would be the first time she would sing without benefit of extravagant sets, costumes, and sed
uctive dance steps that detracted from the thin quality of her voice. In 1995, instead of embarking on a tour to promote her album Bedtime Stories, she studied voice with Joan Leder, one of the best coaches in the industry, for six months before production actually began. The end result was that Madonna not only mastered the complicated musical written by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice, but also developed an upper register that she never knew she possessed. In fact, during the six months that she trained with Leder, Madonna wrote two songs, “One More Chance” and “You’ll See,” for her Something to Remember album. She was now utilizing techniques that she had learned during her voice lessons. While Alan Parker had complete confidence in his star, Andrew Lloyd Webber wondered if she would be willing to forget her star status and work to improve her voice. In her defense, Alan Parker said, “She was determined to sing it as Andrew had scored it. I was sure that she was going to knock people’s socks off. In the end, I was right because she was quite incredible.”

  Curiously, Joan Leder found Madonna to be “surprisingly shy.” “I work clients back-to-back,” Leder explained, “and Madonna always felt that Patti LuPone, who had done the role on Broadway, or Roberta Flack, another one of my clients, always had their ear to the door.”

  Training her voice was not the only challenge Madonna faced when she arrived in London to record. Parker also expected her to grasp the emotions that went along with each song and conjure them up at will. On more than one occasion in the West End recording studios, she would dim the lights and burn candles to create an “ethereal” atmosphere in order to feel “Evita’s pain, frustration, or joy.” In the end, she exceeded even her own expectations, although she considered the whole experience “humbling.” It was no secret that from the very beginning, either Patti LuPone or Elaine Paige had been Webber and Rice’s first choice to portray Eva Perón.

  If Madonna succeeded in mastering the part, Alan Parker also achieved as difficult an accomplishment when, on December 24, 1995, he finally closed the deal to bring Evita to the screen. Optioned by such international directors as Ken Russell, Franco Zeffirelli, Herb Ross, Richard Attenborough, Alan Pakula, Hector Babenco, Francis Ford Coppola, and Oliver Stone, Evita had lingered in development hell for more than fifteen years. Despite their different styles and visions of how they would film Evita, they had all considered Madonna the obvious choice to play the second-rate Argentine actress who had risen from obscurity and poverty to become an international political icon. They had not been able to convince the studios and producers to accept Madonna’s demands concerning salary as well as her suggestions that the composer and lyricist write additional songs for her. Another problem they shared was their inability to secure permission from the Argentine government to film the movie on location in Buenos Aires. From the beginning of every negotiation, it had always been a question of money. The government of Argentina expected to be paid by the movie studio for their cooperation in blocking off streets and allowing unlimited access to the various buildings and monuments throughout the city. In each case, the demands of the government were considered unreasonable by the producers and studios.

  Alan Parker had the most recognizable directorial style when it came to musicals, partly because of his experience with Fame and partly because he had begun his career making television commercials set to music. By the time he was at the helm, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice considered Madonna to be a bad box-office risk. With the exception of her first screen venture in 1985 in Desperately Seeking Susan, she had had a string of bad films to her credit, including Shanghai Surprise, Who’s That Girl, and probably the most embarrassing of all with a cringe factor off the charts, Body of Evidence. Typical of Madonna, who always wants the man who rejects her or that deal that eludes her, when she heard that the role was slipping out of her grasp, she became even more determined to play the former first lady of Argentina. In a desperate attempt to secure the role, she wrote Parker a letter and sent it along with her video “Take a Bow,” which she claimed had been inspired by Eva Perón and the “way she dressed.” The video, made in 1995, was filmed in sepia and filled with scenes of Latin iconography; a finger pierced by a needle, a drop of blood falling into a drink. Madonna is in the stands watching a bullfight. Wearing a 1940s outfit with a veil covering her face, she compares the process of dressing herself to the toreador being fitted into his tight brocade jacket and satin pants to appear in the ring. The clip cuts from Madonna in the stands to Madonna in bed, wearing only sexy underwear, and writhing in what appears to be a masturbatory frenzy.

  “I remember sitting down and writing an impassioned letter to Alan Parker,” Madonna recalls, “listing the reasons why I was the only one who could portray Eva.” She told Parker that she felt a “supernatural drive to play the part.” She concluded, “I can honestly say that I did not write this letter of my own free will. It was as if some other force drove my hand across the page.” She ended the letter by saying that fortune-tellers had been predicting for years that she would one day play Eva Perón on the screen.

  Within days, Parker called Madonna and arranged for her to audition for Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice. Although the composer and lyricist were pleasantly surprised by Madonna’s physical resemblance to Evita, they used that point against her by expressing their concern that her level of celebrity might eclipse the personality of Eva Perón. “Could she be contained,” Webber asked, “in such a controlled atmosphere as moviemaking? After all, there were budgets to consider and a time frame that allowed no room for star temperament or caprice.” Andy Vajna, the producer on Evita when Robert Stigwood had the film, and the producer as well for Alan Parker, recalled that he was concerned because “here was this pop icon and we weren’t sure what we were getting involved in.” As a result, Vajna called Penny Marshall, who had directed Madonna in A League of Their Own, and asked how she was to work with. According to Vajna, Marshall told him, “You don’t have to worry about anything.”

  When Webber and Rice were still not convinced, Alan Parker made the point that despite her previous track record, she was still one of the few female stars who could attract large crowds at the box office, and Hollywood musicals, with the exception of Grease, which had appeared in 1978, were almost always losing propositions. In the end, they relented, and Parker closed the deal. Madonna would star as Eva Perón for a fee of $1 million. Despite her sense of triumph, Madonna admitted to several close friends that she felt as if she was going into a project with all the “odds stacked against her.” On one hand, she had faith that the part would finally catapult her to respectful stardom, while on the other, she felt that everyone was just waiting for her to fail. Only after she had finished recording and was at the stage when she had to lip-synch the songs while actually shooting the scenes did she discover, much to her delight, that the process was similar to making videos. Months later, when the film was finally finished, Madonna breathed a sigh of relief.

  “I consider it an act of God that I got Evita,” she told Parker. What Madonna did not know at the time was that Alan Parker, like his predecessors, was having problems getting permission from the Argentine government to film certain key scenes on location. He knew that if he was forced to make the movie on a soundstage, he would fail to project the mystical undercurrent of evil that had pervaded Argentina during the Perónist era. Parker didn’t tell Madonna she wasn’t the only one who would consider it an act of God if the film ever got made.

  To make his star feel at home and relaxed in her new environment, Alan Parker had arranged for Tim Rice, the lyricist for Evita, to shepherd Madonna around London and to introduce her to interesting people. It was an especially happy time for Tim Rice, not only because Evita was finally going into production, but also because Rice had four musicals running in theaters in Los Angeles: Jesus Christ Superstar, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Chess Moves, and Beauty and the Beast. Even more exciting for Rice, he was in the middle of a collaboration with Elton John for a Broadway production of Aida. br />
  As arranged, Rice telephoned Madonna at noon the following day at her hotel and was surprised when his star informed him that for the moment she would not be venturing out in public. After unpacking her Jean-Paul Gaultier wardrobe, she had decided to transform herself into what she imagined was the typical British woman. To achieve that new image before she transformed herself once again into Eva Perón, she had called Gianni Versace in New York and asked him to design a somber tweed suit with a skirt that fell demurely to the knee for her “London incarnation.” Until the suit arrived two days later, Madonna hid in her $3,000-a-night penthouse suite at Claridge’s.

  When Madonna finally received Tim Rice in her hotel suite, she found that they had something in common about their mutual interest in Evita. At the end of her first year of high school, Madonna had been listening to one of her favorite rock stations when the disc jockey had talked about a woman named Eva Perón. Madonna had been fascinated to learn that the wife of Juan Perón had survived poverty to become an inspiration to her country as well as a spiritual and religious icon to her people long after her death. Sitting with Rice in London, Madonna learned that he had also first heard about Evita by chance on the radio. According to Rice, he had been set to do Jeeves for the London stage (along with Andrew Lloyd Webber and Alan Ayckbourn, who provided the book and lyrics) when he happened to hear a program on his car radio about Eva Perón, “the poor girl from a shabby suburb of Buenos Aires who had climbed to the top of Argentine politics and society.” It was then that the idea for Evita had begun to take form and Rice had set out to research the life and death of Eva Perón. In February 1974, Rice had made his first trip down to Buenos Aires to get a sense of the local color and atmosphere, which he would successfully re-create on the stage.

  In London with the woman who would re-create the role on the screen, Rice, the consummate gentleman as well as the lyricist who was concerned about his score and his star, squired Madonna around town. Privately, he was convinced that when people knew she was eager to be asked to all the A-list parties and events, his baby-sitting job would be over. Unfortunately, the empty guest book she kept on the glass table in her penthouse suite was a sad indication of her failure to make new friends. She had come to conquer London, and despite her staid tweed suit, no one seemed to be clamoring for her. With pressure mounting to complete the arrangements for the musical score, Tim Rice became increasingly unavailable, and as he did, Madonna became increasingly lonely. With only three weeks left before she was to begin recording, she decided to summon Carlos Leon and her friend Ingrid Casares over to London.