Life with My Sister Madonna (16 page)

However, when we leave the restaurant, we are besieged by the waiting paparazzi and realize that someone must have tipped them off. But at least we've had a few untroubled hours in a paparazzi-free zone.

 

E
ACH DAY, THE
British press attack Madonna and Sean in viler terms. So far, the
Daily Mail
has lambasted her as “the Queen of Slut Rock playing at Garbo, but playing it oh so badly.” The
Daily Express
has posed the rhetorical question “Will Madonna and her man ever clean up their act?” Countless other scathing articles have appeared in the British press, and Madonna is hurt and bemused.

“Christopher, I don't understand why people are writing this kind of shit about me,” she says.

I can't blame her for being puzzled. After all, until now the British press have been among her strongest allies and have always been kind to her. But, thanks to Sean, who isn't half as much a star as Madonna now is, they have all turned against her.

Finally, George Harrison calls a press conference to defend his stars. On the afternoon of March 6, 1986, at the Roof Gardens—a stylish sixth-floor restaurant above Kensington High Street, London, where pink flamingos stalk around ornate formal gardens—seventy-five members of the British press gather to meet Madonna.

Sean was originally scheduled to take part in the press conference as well, but at the last minute, it was decided that it was far more politic for him not to attend.

Madonna and George sit side by side at a small table. Four bodyguards hover nearby. George is in a blue-and-white shirt and a blue suit and chews gum. Madonna is in a black dress with white cuffs, her hair is down, and her lipstick is bright red.

She looks exceptionally beautiful.

George starts the conference by welcoming the assembled members of the British press, then asks for order. I stand on the side and watch as Madonna fields the first question: “What kind of a boss is George Harrison and were you a Beatlemaniac?”

The question is benign, and so is Madonna's answer: “I wasn't a Beatlemaniac. I don't think I really appreciated their songs until I was much older. I was too young to really get caught up in the craze. But he's a great boss, very understanding and sympathetic.”

So far, so good. Madonna and I have been lulled into a false sense of security, unaware of the fearlessness of the British press when faced with a global superstar, and of their capacity for asking direct if impertinent questions. George clearly is, hence his decision not to subject the hotheaded Sean to their interrogation. By the third question, “Is it fun working with your husband, Sean Penn?” the writing is on the wall. Initially, Madonna deftly sidesteps any problems by giving a bland answer: “Of course it is. He's a pro. He's worked on several films and his experience has helped me.”

The next question is more of a zinger: “Has it caused any personal problems off set? Do you row at all?”

George jumps in before Madonna can answer. “Do you row with your wife?”

The journalist is temporarily silenced. The questions become more general, but only for a few moments, then they are again aimed at eliciting comments from George or Madonna on Sean's tantrums.

Did they expect the kind of coverage they received? Would George work with Sean again? “Sure, I happen to like Sean very much,” George counters.

Madonna stays silent until a journalist asks why Sean isn't at the press conference.

I give a silent answer:
If Sean were here, most of the journalists in this room would have been toast by now.

George says, “Because he's busy working.”

Madonna backs him up with “He's in more scenes than I am,” which is true.

Then the press go directly on the offensive. A journalist asks, “Madonna, I wonder if either you or your husband would like to apologize for incidents which have involved bad behavior on your behalf.”

Madonna draws herself up to her full height. “I have nothing to apologize for.”

George laces into the press. When a journalist challenges him with “We have loads of film stars over here, but never have had these sorts of fights,” Madonna comes to her own defense and I'm proud of her.

“When Robert De Niro comes to the airport, are there twenty photographers that sit on his limousine and don't allow him to leave the airport?” she asks.

Things become increasingly ugly when George says, “We expected nonanimals,” and a journalist leaps up and yells, “Talking of animals, is it true Sean Penn has been on the set giving orders?”

George counterattacks. Then the journalists bring up the incident at the airport and say, “It wasn't the press that was at fault.”

Madonna looks genuinely upset.

I want to sock the journalist. I stand up and say, “I was in the car. He got up and then lay down again for the photographers.”

Madonna mouths me a silent
Thank you.

In the face of the unrelenting British media onslaught, she is calm and polite, and the tide of public opinion begins to turn in her favor.

But when
Shanghai Surprise,
which ends up costing an estimated $17 million to make, premieres in August, then goes into release at four hundred U.S. theaters, the reviews are abysmal, with
Time
's critic declaring, “Madonna seems straightjacketed by her role and Penn, for once, looked bored,” and Pauline Kael in
The New Yorker
dubbing the movie a “listless bore of a film.”

But instead of becoming downhearted or depressed by the reviews, Madonna refocuses her attention on her music career, which just zooms from strength to strength. “Live to Tell,” the theme to Sean's
At Close Range,
is released and hits number one in the United States. Madonna is featured on the cover of
Rolling Stone.
“Papa Don't Preach” (the lyrics of which, despite speculation to the contrary, are not rooted in anything to do with our father) is released and hits number one on the U.S. charts for two weeks, while “True Blue” stays there for five.

I eventually see
Shanghai Surprise
and am embarrassed at how bad it is. Madonna and Sean have zero on-screen chemistry. Not that I am surprised, because offscreen there is little tenderness between them either.

Clearly, neither of them ever examined their own performances. Overall, the movie is a victim of the creative control Sean and Madonna exerted over it.

However, Madonna flatly refuses to take any responsibility for the movie's failure.

“It's all Sean's fault,” she tells me, in a voice that brooks no contradiction.

 

A
FTER THE FIASCO
of
Shanghai Surprise,
Sean and Madonna start living separate lives. With at least fifteen paparazzi routinely hanging out in front of the New York apartment on Central Park West that they have recently purchased, Sean spends as much time as possible in L.A.

Madonna flies out to L.A. intermittently to be with him, but they end up fighting all the time primarily because Bukowski is always around the house, still drunk as a skunk. Madonna wants him out of the house, and Sean doesn't.

Anytime Sean does come to town, the three of us hang out at the Pyramid, a dark, dingy little bar on Avenue A between Ninth and Tenth, where Madonna, Erika, and I once did a track date. But before we can reminisce and marvel at how far we've come, the moment we get inside the door, Sean has to fight for Madonna's attention—just as Danny often has to fight for mine. Madonna and I have both fallen for possessive, jealous men, and we pay the price.

Whether or not Sean likes it, he's compelled to face that we are on her territory now, and everyone wants a piece of her, and he's not the main event. And when he and Madonna leave the bar, photographers are waiting outside, ready to grab a shot of her. Everything surrounding Madonna is frantic. The press is pulling them apart. Moreover, she is now far more famous than he is. She overshadows him completely, which must feel emasculating. I can't help being aware of the irony that the man who has always aspired to be the James Dean of his generation has now been relegated to the role of a surly underling trailing around in his wife's starry wake.

 

O
CTOBER
1986. M
ADONNA
calls me and breaks the devastating news that Martin Burgoyne, one of our oldest friends and her first road manager, is very sick with AIDS. Although not too much is understood about the disease at this time, we already know a few people who have AIDS and both of us understand the tragic implications. Madonna pays Marty's medical expenses at St. Vincent's Hospital. Madonna and I go to the hospital together to visit him one day. While she is with Marty, I wait outside his room. When she emerges, her face is stained with tears. He dies within a month. He was just twenty-four years old.

Apart from giving Marty as much financial support as possible and easing his last days, Madonna has already established an impressive track record in raising money for AIDS research and braves a media storm by participating as a model at the AIDS benefit fashion show at Barneys New York that will benefit St. Vincent's AIDS research clinic. Right up until the midnineties, her personal involvement in fighting the disease and raising money to benefit AIDS sufferers remains passionate and unimpeachable.

Like Princess Diana, she has no fear of AIDS, and her commitment to its victims will help raise public consciousness of this harrowing disease.

At the end of the year, the release of Madonna's “Open Your Heart” single and video—in which she simulates a kiss with an underage boy—causes yet another high-octane Madonna-style controversy. The video of
The Virgin Tour
wins a
Billboard
Music Award for the Top Music Video of 1986, and she wins the AMA award for Favorite Pop/Rock Female Video Artist for “Papa Don't Preach” and makes a surprise appearance at the Shrine Auditorium and collects the award in person. Accepting awards—apart from the elusive Grammy, which she still hasn't won—is becoming an everyday occurrence for her.

When rehearsals for her next tour—
Who's That Girl?
—begin, I agree to be her dresser again. Better to be on the road than here in Manhattan, where AIDS is now decimating the gay men in the city and a creeping sadness is pervading our once carefree existence.

Danny is, of course, deeply opposed to my touring again with Madonna. But he hasn't got a chance of stopping me. Despite that I've been with him for four years now, and I love him, I still want what I want. Unlike
The Virgin Tour,
this will be a world tour, so I'll get to visit Europe and Japan. And since Sean is pretty much out of the picture, Madonna and I are closer than ever, and I really want to help her weather this tour.

Whenever anyone comes out with the usual crap that Madonna's success is due to luck, I am always outraged. Through the years, I witness the rigors of her pre-tour preparations. The moment a tour is scheduled, she starts training with a vengeance. When the
Who's That Girl?
tour begins, she will run six miles in the morning, then do a two-hour show in the evening. Her self-discipline is impressive, her stamina superhuman, and it's far from easy to keep up with her.

By the time the
Who's That Girl?
tour kicks off, she's lost the slightly plump look she had on
The Virgin Tour
and is now sleek, with a sinewy, muscled back. Her body is lean, but still soft and feminine. She is much more athletic, sure of her body, sure of herself.

Who's That Girl?
is far more theatrical than
The Virgin Tour
and has a Spanish theme. She has recently released “La Isla Bonita,” which hits number four in the U.S. charts and will remain an enduring favorite among her fans. Not every scene is Spanish-oriented, though. When Madonna sings a medley of “Dress You Up,” “Holiday,” and “Material Girl,” she wears rhinestone-studded harlequin glasses, and her dress, decorated with dice, charms, and plastic toys, is extremely difficult for her to wear as it is boned for support. She keeps bitching that she “can't dance in these fucking bones,” but still does. The dress is also extremely tight, and when I disrobe her, her body is covered in red marks as if she were a medieval martyr scourged in the service of her faith.

By now, I've got the change of clothes and the whole backstage operation down pat. I am braced to ignore all the tirades Madonna unleashes on me practically every time she storms offstage. I know how to cope on every level, and she trusts me implicitly, secure in the knowledge that she can rely on me completely.

I still have to pick up the dancers' clothes after the show, collect baggage at the airport, and have the costumes delivered to each room. I hate it, but grin and bear it because I love every moment of working on the show, traveling everywhere, and making sure that backstage everything goes smoothly.