Savannah Morning News, Friday, October 23,1992 - 3D

* * * * Savannah Morning News, Friday, October 23,1992 - 3D

Sex

gested she go out to a variety of normally drab public places naked. At one location - a pizza parlor Meisel explains, "we set up all the equipment first. Then she came in with a coat on. It-was crowded. At one point I just said, 'OK, Madonna, take it off.' My assistant grabbed the coat and Madonna just started to eat the pizza nude." What followed was "complete chaos. Everyone started yelling, the woman behind us rang the fire alarm." The star and crew managed to escape before the police arrived, but for Madonna the nude scenes took an extra twist. "Few people recognized her," Meisel explains, "which was a shock." In other words/the generic sight of a naked woman in public still upstages the idea of Madonna. "She found that liberating," Meisel explains. The photographer hopes the book has the same effect on readers. "The whole idea of the book is to help people not be ashamed of their sexual fantasies. For young people, this book opens up their eyes to a lot of different things - nudity, not being afraid of your body, homosexuality. And that fantasies don't have to be hidden. They make people's sex lives more interesting and healthy." As well, Meisel says, Madonna wanted to upend the notion of a star's naked pictures being consid-

Continued From Page 1D

under lock and key from the press - and not giving consumers a peek unJess they shell out $49.95 - is a sure-fire way to insure speculation soars as high as possible. As such, can its creators honestly blame fans for gossiping about everything from the inclusion of an incest fantasy (a widespread rumor) to speculations on, say, a cannibalism scene (just kidding about that one)? According to the book's editor, Nanscy Neiman, the incest rumor "is a fantasy unto itself. I don't know where that came from." She and Meisel are quick to point out that the project had limits (besides the fact one must be 18 to buy it). "No-MX with children or animals, or religious objects/' Neiman explains. "It's amazing how inventive she can be and not do those things," the editor laughs. According to Meisel, the project was an equal collaboration between him and the star. "She came to me with ideas, and I tried my best to come up with images as exciting as her thoughts about sex," he says. One surrounded exhibitionism. "She wanted to know the best way to show that," says Meisel. He sug-

Timeline Continued From Page 1D fuzzy. Late 1986: The "Open Your Heart" dip ranks as her first top*rate piece of video art but it outrages MTV execs. They demand she cut out the shot that connects a billboard of a naked lady to an admiring young boy. The star says take it or leave it. MTV caves in. Summer 1988: Madonna befriends Sandra Bernhard after seeing her show "Without You I'm Nothing." Later they go on "Late Night with David Letterman" and pretend (?) they're having an affair. Jan. 5,1989: Madonna files for divorce from Sean Penn. March 1989: Madonna's "Like a Prayer" video proves to be her most insanely provocative to date. It features her having sex with a black saint in a church. More shocking, the clip features Madonna's natural hair color. Pepsi execs are not amused. They cancel a multi-mHIion-dollar tiein campaign that also uses the song "Like a Prayer." The commercial is shown only once, but Madonna gets to keep all the money. Lucky hert

ered scandalous. "Usually, these kinds of images are discovered/' says Meisel. "We're doing this openly." Neiman knows not everyone will find such a notion warming. "I expect a range of reactions," she says. "Some people are going to find the book shocking beyond their endurance. Some will say, 'Ha! I've thought of more interesting things than that.' And the great majority will be shocked and titillated at the same time. Which, frankly, is what sexual fantasy is all about." One wonders which category the top brass at Time Warner will fail into. Already, they blew a fuse over Ice-T's "Cop Killer." Will Madonna make them lunge for another fistful of Advil? Neiman would not speculate, saying only, "The corporate level does not get involved in the editorial judgments of its divisions." But she does assert: "Nothing in the book is pornographic by anyone's definition." Meisel agrees, but is irked by the entire question. "What's wrong with pornography? I like pornography." And, he adds, people tend to have different definitions of what makes something pornographic anyway - particularly politicians. Which begs the question: Could this book wind up a political football? "Politicians are just like other Americans," smiles Neiman. "Why deny them the right to talk about Madonna?"

____ Spring 1990: Madonna re- chy water. A masterpiece. leases the "Vogue" video, which October 1991: A rash of books brings a dance trend from the gay are published that reveal things like black underground to Even/town the fact that as a starving artist in U.S.A., proving conclusively her New York she ate out of garbage sense of cultural cunning. cans. The world's amused reaction Summer 1990: The Blond Am- proves that not only is she scandalbition Tour kicks off, turning point in proof, she's also over-exposureMadonna's ascent from an enjoyabty proof. randy distraction to a pointedly defiSpring 1992: Rumors circulate ant artist. It's the first time Madonna is in complete control of her liberat- that Madonna is HIV-positive - a ing sexual messages. ___ notion she heroically quashes by saying that if such talk comes as a November 1990: Madonna consequence of her famous work to and new beau (ex-gay-porn star fight AIDS, so be it. Tony Ward) cavort in a French hotel September 1992: Word gets in the video for "Justify My Love," a rather whimsical S&M fantasy. MTV out of the first collection of scholarly bans the video, prompting a publicity studies on Madonna to be published bonanza that lands Madonna on in December. The title? "The Ma"Nightline." donna Connection: Representational May 1991: Madonna grants an Politics, Subcuitural Identities, and amazing two-part interview to the Cultural Theory." national gay and lesbian magazine Oct. 2, 1992: Madonna reThe Advocate. In it, she outs her leases her "Erotica" video, a serious brother and says every man needs S&M fantasy that resembles the unto have another man's tongue down derground experimental films of his throat. For starters. Kenneth Anger. MTV plays it just May 1991: Madonna releases three times, NBC bans it outright. "Truth Or Dare," a self-expose of The single debuts high, at No. 13, the "Blond Ambition" tour during on the pop charts (it's now No. 3). Oct. 20-21, 1992: "Erotica" and which she bullies then-lover Warren Beatty, mocks Kevin Costner and re- "Sex" are released amid a media veals a new talent on a bottle of vi- frenzy.

Madonna's Album Strikes New Ground A Review

Wallpaper Sale! All ln-*tock Pattern*

By JIM F ARBER

, , roll„ per single

New Yo* Daly N«w»

MADONNA "Erotica" (Warner Brothers) No one could doubt her verbal daring. Few could question her sense of visual revolt. But in her music, Madonna has long been a - gasp! - conservative. Since the start, Madonna has anchored her music on pure pop, making sure to sculpt candysweet melodies over even her most rhythm-driven material. Not until 1990s "I'm Breathless (Music Inspired by Dick Tracy)" did Madonna attempt to seriously art things up. Not only did she take on Stephen Sondheim, she scribbled her own sound-alike material. But if such a move seemed risky, the result came off as retrograde and pleading; yet another failed attempt to be taken seriously by the Hollywood "grownups." Thankfully, Madonna's latest couldn't care less about that. Instead of trying to sound sophisticated, or straining to lure an antique notion of the mainstream, she went the opposite direction; plunging directly into cuttingedge club and street music. It's the first truly radical album of her career. Like the most uncompromising of these records, her new tracks are obsessed with humongous bass lines, brutish percussion and detached vocals, often submerged in the mix for a hint of the subliminal. Such an approach gives Madonna's music a focus she never before dared; one that, like her sensibility, derives entirely from disenfranchised cultures. The album's zenith has to be the title track. Capturing the complexity of a full S&M scene, "Erotica" balances controlled cruelty with ironic tenderness. In doing so, Madonna gleefully stretches the subject matter of pop just as her music brings the underground up.

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