Madonna (38 page)

After chatting about what Madonna was up to, Letterman turned the line of questioning to her friendship with Bernhard and Grey. “We carouse,” explained Madonna.
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The controversy swung into full gear when the pair of girls on the loose claimed that they frequented the notorious lesbian nightclub the Cubby Hole. Sandra then blurted out that, on separate occasions, she had slept with both Madonna and Sean, and found Madonna to be the more pleasurable partner of the two. Although the performance was meant to be in jest, when the press got hold of the story, everyone began speculating as to whether or not Madonna was having a sexual affair with Sandra.

Throughout her career, there has been public talk and speculation about Bernhard's sexual orientation. After this television appearance with Madonna, wherever Sandra went, innuendo followed. As part of the media mind-fuck, Bernhard has proceeded to make conflicting statements about whether or not she is in fact gay.

After their controversial appearance on Letterman's show, Sandra explained that particular evening by claiming, “That was never something that was planned or that was intentional at all. We never said, ‘Let's go out and be lesbians.' It was really like ‘Let's just be girlfriends—silly, juvenile girlfriends.' The whole lesbian thing being read into it was just stupid, ridiculous.”
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Explaining how the impromptu Madonna appearance on “Late Night” came to be, Bernhard said, “Because we thought it would be fun.”
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Madonna was later to illuminate the burning question as to whether or not the duo indeed frequented the Greenwich Village lesbian hotspot. “I've never been to the Cubby Hole,” she says. “That's the joke of it. My brother lives around the corner [from there], and I've walked by it with him, and I sort of go, ‘Oh, yeah—look, there's a lesbian club.' Sandra and I were just fucking with people.”
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Regarding speculation about an affair between her and Jennifer Grey, Madonna says, “That came out of me and Sandra Bernhard. Then it became a question of whatever female I had a close relationship with who is an outspoken girl—which Jennifer is—then I must be sleeping with her.”
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When the press wasn't talking about Madonna's supposed affairs with women, including Sandra and Jennifer, and men, including John F. Kennedy, Jr., they were talking about her clothes. The dress that Madonna wore in the European “True Blue” video was given to MTV for a traveling display called “MTV's Museum of Unnatural History.” The powder blue rhinestone-spangled dress was part of the display when the exhibit of rock and roll memorabilia rolled into Novi, Michigan, at the Twelve Oaks Mall. The dress vanished on July 15 from its Plexiglas display case and was recovered from a growth of bushes three days later. Apparently the perp, nineteen-year-old Krista Maria O'Sada, had stolen the dress on a dare from her friends. Once the robbery was completed successfully, the girl feared getting caught with it and ditched it in the bushes. That same week, it was found by another group of teenagers, and returned to the police.

When the end of the summer came, so did Madonna's run in
Speed-the-Plow
. The role of Karen was taken over by an unknown actress named Felicity Huffman. The minute that Madonna, Mantegna, and Silver left the cast, ticket sales for the play dropped off. Several weeks later it closed.

In retrospect, Madonna concedes that the show wasn't an especially fun experience, but it served a purpose. “If you asked, ‘Would you ever do it again?' I'd have to say, ‘Definitely,'” she claims.
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However, the next time around, she wants to be the one in creative control.

On September 11, Madonna was one of the celebrity runners in a charity event called “The Race Against Time.” According to her promo statement for this, “You can save a child from starvation. All you need is a pair of running shoes.”
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The event, which was to benefit the charity known as Care, called for simultaneous runs in fifteen cities across America. Madonna was the symbolic 1,000,001st participant to pledge her time.

The next entry on her pressing schedule called for recording a new album, for release the following year. Recorded in Los Angeles that fall, it was to be her most personalized work to date.

Since the summer of 1988 had been one of long separations for Madonna and Sean, during the coming months they planned to spend as much time as they could together. Sean accepted a role in the Los Angeles cast of David Rabe's hit play
Hurly-Burly
. He wanted to be near his wife while she worked on her album. However, instead of rekindling the flames of their love, the whole marriage ended up exploding in their faces—and onto the front pages of every major publication.

At this point Madonna had just about reached the end of her rope with Sean and his excessive drinking. When
Hurly-Burly
was in rehearsal, she would show up to pick him up and drive him home—to make certain he wouldn't go out and get drunk.

Meanwhile, Madonna had been cavorting about Hollywood with her new best friend Sandra Bernhard. In the middle of the
Hurly-Burly
opening night party in Century City, Sean and Madonna had a huge fight over her controversial friendship with Sandra. Several witnesses claim that when Madonna showed up at the party with her so-called “gal pal” Sandra, Sean screamed at her, “You cunt, how could you do this to me:

She had also been seeing a lot of Warren Beatty, who was openly courting her to play a role in his upcoming film version of the adventures of comic strip hero
Dick Tracy
. Madonna and Warren were seen having intimate dinners together at a Los Angeles restaurant called Sushi Cove, not far from Warren's estate. Occasionally they would dine alone, and on other evenings Sandra would accompany them.

Madonna and Sean argued almost nonstop after Thanksgiving and all through the holiday season. After one big blowout, Sean moved out of the couple's Malibu house to stay with his parents, four miles away. There, Sean would get drunk and call Madonna. During his late-night phone calls, Sean would hurl obscenities at her and make drunken threats. She was so sick of his liquor-ridden tirades that she got into the habit of leaving the answering machine on. Fearing for her safety, Madonna's friends, including Sandra Bernhard, would come over and spend the night with her.

Several people had access to the couple's private phone number and could dial in to hear the hate-filled messages Sean had left for Madonna. Recalls one source, “He left one message for her toward the end—'You can continue to suck the big dick of Hollywood if you want to, but you can count me out!'”
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If the uncontested tabloid reports are to be believed, on the night of December 28, a drunk and irrational Sean frightened Madonna to death when he burst into their house and began to scream charges at her about her relationships with Beatty and Bernhard. Sean reportedly overpowered Madonna, tied her up, gagged her, and left her alone in the house for up to nine hours, unable to move. When the inebriated Penn returned later, she persuaded him to untie her by promising him a romantic night of reconciliation. When he undid the knots, she ran to her car and phoned the police. She immediately filed an assault charge against Sean. Concerned about her own safety, she fled the house and went to stay with her manager, Freddy DeMann.

The
Star
reported of Sean's actions: “He climbed the wall, broke into the house, found Madonna there alone, tied her up and scared her.” The article went on to say, “Penn bound and gagged his wife, hog-tying her to an armchair with twine, then started yelling at her and slapping her.”
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Sean's attack and alleged physical abuse was confirmed by records at the Malibu Police Station. According to Detective John Flaherty, “a possible assault had been attempted.”
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Although Madonna has been quite forthcoming about all of the seamy details of her life since then, she has never confirmed or denied any of the pieced-together accounts of that outlandish evening. Days later, in a lame attempt to gloss over accounts of the attack, Penn's publicist John West issued a red herring of a statement which read: “Sean and Madonna are separated. They plan to divorce and it's amicable.”
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On January 5, 1989, in a Los Angeles court, Madonna again filed divorce papers on the grounds of irreconcilable differences.
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All the paperwork was complete and ready to sign, as Madonna's lawyers had prepared the necessary documents a year before.

Because of Sean's previous arrests and the terms of his probation, Madonna had him in a compromising position. If she didn't withdraw the assault charges, Sean faced a possible ninety days in jail. She dropped the charges on January 10, but only after he signed the divorce papers she presented him with. In the settlement, he retained the couple's Malibu house, and she kept the New York apartment. She had already secured a new house for herself in the Hollywood hills, which she took possession of two weeks later.

Once all the documents had been signed, on January 10 the assault charges were dropped, according to Al Albergate, spokesman for Deputy District Attorney Lauren Weiss. “Madonna asked that there be no criminal charges pressed,” Albergate confirmed. “There is no other evidence with which to base a criminal charge so there won't be a criminal charge filed.”
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Was Madonna “trussed up like a turkey,” as gossip columnist Liz Smith and several other sources claim? “I am absolutely convinced that these reports were accurate,” claims Jerry George, one of the editors of the
National Enquirer
, who worked on the story and consulted with the Malibu Police Department.
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Madonna claimed that the tabloids were all “extremely inaccurate, as they usually are. They're always making shit up. I've completely reconciled myself to that fact.”
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She, however, would not disclose the exact details of that evening, although police records show she claimed that she was both detained against her will by Sean that night, and that he had been guilty of “assault.” Whether or not the “trussed turkey” theory is 100 percent accurate, it has become part of the accepted legend of Madonna's breakup with Sean.

Oddly enough, according to Madonna, to this day Sean remains the one true love of her life. She simply couldn't stand the pressure that marriage to him caused. Sean's out-of-control drinking problems and irrational hot temper, teamed with her naturally flirtatious and gregarious ways, finally spelled the dramatic end of the Poison Penns.

Madonna originally had high hopes for their marriage, but for once in her life things didn't turn out the way she had planned. Never one to miss a beat, within weeks of her divorce she turned around and launched a string of hot projects that were to leave Sean and all memories of their stormy marriage in the dust.

 I wouldn't have turned out

 the way I was if I didn't have

 all those old-fashioned values

 to rebel against.
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—Madonna

 

N
o sooner had the press coverage about her divorce and her evening tied to a chair subsided, than the buzz about Madonna's new album,
Like a Prayer
, began. With the exception of four songs on the
Who's That Girl?
soundtrack, plus the cuts “Santa Baby” and “Spotlight,” it had been three years since Madonna released a full album of new material. A lengthy hiatus like that can be a difficult hurdle to overcome for most female artists. The public is very fickle, and it was a year in which the latest albums from Diana Ross, Cyndi Lauper, and Aretha Franklin all died on the charts. However, with incredible ease, Madonna simply reinvented herself, milked the media for all it was worth, and triumphed again.

Her divorce from Sean Penn came at just the right time. His movie career of late had relegated him to the role of “Mr. Madonna,” and the public was sick and tired of hearing about his childish, unprofessional antics. He had become a painful weight around her neck, but the publicity from their
Star Wars—
like breakup created the perfect launching pad for her newest projects. Freed from the negative force field that Sean created, Madonna was ready to soar to new heights. She emerged with a new look, a new sound, a new image, and, to put it bluntly, she kicked ass.

For the new album, Madonna looked within herself and drew upon her own life and emotional experiences. Whenever Madonna releases a new album, it is a major media event, but this one seemed to top them all in controversy and coverage. When it was released, the
Like a Prayer
album was not the giddy nonstop dance fest that one had come to expect from Madonna. Instead, it was a multi-textured, elaborate, and deeply personal work. With all the songs composed by Madonna herself, at least half the material was revealingly autobiographical. In fact, Madonna's whole family played heavily in the picture. She reconciled the death of her mother with the poignant ballad, “Promise to Try.” She confronted her still-unresolved relationship with her dad in the song “Oh Father,” and she sang about her brothers and sisters on the hot dance number “Keep It Together.” To tie it all up with a bow, Madonna inscribed in the liner notes: “This album is dedicated to my mother, who taught me how to pray.”
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Since her last album, Madonna had turned thirty. Although it was not a widely publicized event, it represented a turning point in how she perceived herself. Of her thirtieth birthday, Madonna said, “I wouldn't say it was traumatic. It's like, ‘Oh shucks, I can't be twenty anymore.' It seems like when you're twenty there's more of an opportunity for you to behave childishly and get away with it. When you're thirty, you have to really grow up and get responsible.”
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