Well, today is Madonna’s birthday. It’s like the birth of the Baby Jesus to the Gay World. The day our queen (amongst queens) plopped onto planet Earth with a little bounce that turned into a thrumming disco thud.
I must admit that Madonna’s birthday is a little bittersweet for me. You see, I spent a meaningful afternoon with M several years ago and, well, the bitch never spoke to me again. Now, I call her a bitch with love and respect. After all, anyone who has featured herself trussed like a leather-bound Thanksgiving fetish goose and had a knife wielded at her wazoo by a shaved and pierced dyke can take a little “bitch” from little ol’ me.
Meanwhile, back to my bitter heart. M was in Toronto promoting a little album called Ray of Light. I was writing a radio show in those days and suggested we get an interview with Madonna for our little audio offering. I was told by one of the on-air personalities that if he couldn’t get an interview with her, I was spit-out-of-luck. The gauntlet had been thrown.
Madonna and I made eye contact in that moment.
I looked at her. She looked at me.
After a week of media relations wrangling, I was told I got a spot at the press conference at the Sutton Place Hotel. I arrived with a New Testament (or should I say, Zohar) –sized list of questions and a soundman. As I stood with the other media cattle guess who should walk in the room right beside me? That’s right, Carla Collins. But that’s another story. Yep, it was the newly mystical one. She had her hippie hair and her little rays of light stuck to the edges of her very large, very cobalt blue eyes. She was a vision of celestial bliss, bathed in the glow of new motherhood—and spectacular wealth.
Madonna and I made eye contact in that moment. I looked at her. She looked at me. I smiled at her. She looked at somebody else. I guess that the guy next to me a bigger, um, lens. As the shutterbugs snapped away at the pop icon, I got out my little handheld and was about to snap a few candid’s when one of her gorillas pushed my arm down and said I wasn’t wearing the right credentials to take her picture. Yeesh! I was wearing my funky new shirt from Le Chateau, what the hell else did he want from me?
Crestfallen, I made my way to my seat and awaited M to take the stage for the press conference. Now, I had taken this assignment seriously as I was not just a fan but I was a somewhat serious entertainment writer (if one can actually be a serious entertainment writer…I mean, think about it!). The press conference got off to an auspicious start when a “journalist” stood up and asked our Madonna if she had chosen the father of her next child as of yet? So, it was going to be one of those press conferences.
As things plodded on, a guy got up and began to sing Holiday. She laughed and told him not to quit his day job—something I don’t think he had. Others asked her about being a new mother (she smiled stiffly-yet-politely and insisted on talking about her new album), and some wanted to discuss her newfound faith, Kabbalah.
I was beginning to have a thrombo. I had actually researched her album! Holy crap. I actually had questions that didn’t involve her uterus, her soul, her baby or her reproductive proclivities. I was obviously brought up right. I mean, would you walk up to a perfect stranger and ask them what they had cooking in their womb? I think not!
My turn came. I stood in front of the room. I smiled at Madonna (who clearly didn’t remember me from my earlier smile), introduced myself and launched into questions about the lyrical content on ROL and the production values (all watery and liquidly lovely). She answered enthusiastically, and even chuckled a couple of times. We had connected! She got me and I got her. We were bonding right there in front of the world media (I know this because my brother called me from L.A. and said he saw me on the NBC Nightly News).
I knew we would go on to be great pals, doing yoga together with Sting
Finally, I finished off with this little Kabbalah-related question: “There are 13 songs on ROL and 13 is a lucky number in Kabbalah. Is that intentional or just a happy coincidence?” She leveled those laser eyes at me, smiled and said, “I intended that.” Sure. But what the hell, we had made a metaphysical connection. I knew I had won her respect. I knew we would go on to be great pals, doing yoga together with Sting every time she was in Toronto, trading lyrics of new songs with me and even inviting me to sing a moving duet on an upcoming album.
Funny, she must have lost my contact information, because I never heard from Madonna again.
Oh well, happy birthday, anyway.
