Madonna Dances With Death

Madonna stood in a silvery bodysuit on an arena stage, having just landed back on Earth after flying around in a suspended box while singing “Ray of Light.” Her audience’s eyes were still recovering from her high-wire gyrations, her postapocalyptic backup ravers, and her many, many lasers. But there was a new reason to gasp: A black-robed figure was creeping up behind Madonna.

Death was coming for the queen of pop.

Thoughts of mortality were already in the air. She was originally supposed to kick off the Celebration Tour—a greatest-hits revue—this summer, but a bacterial infection put her in the intensive-care unit in June. She recovered, but, as she told the audience at Brooklyn’s Barclays Center on Wednesday—the postponed opening night for the tour’s U.S. leg—she really had feared she wouldn’t survive. In our youth-worshipping culture, Madonna’s mere existence as a 65-year-old woman who’s still in the spotlight already feels like a provocation, a performance. One might expect her to use this tour to assert her unkillability; instead she’s making impermanence part of the act.

The event’s emcee, Bob the Drag Queen, announced that this was not merely a show but a celebration. As the night wore on, the distinction felt important: This was a concert as commemoration, focused as much on Madonna’s impact as her output. She and her dancers reprised iconic (an overused, but in this case absolutely appropriate, term) outfits, including her conical bra and her A League of Their Own jersey. Video montages ticked through her old controversies, quips, and exes (hello, Tupac!). Madonna, we were reminded, has been a role model for pursuing one’s desires; as Bob put it, she “taught us how to fuck.”

Read More (...)