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Get on with it Madge….

6th June 2012 by Helena Leave a Comment  

The other night I went to see Madonna. I of course remember her from ‘Holiday’ days, and that brilliant film (or at least I thought it was brilliant at the time) ‘Desperately Seeking Susan’. So for days before the concert I listened to all her old hits and skipped around the house thinking about all the dancing Pauline and I (pictured below) would do.
Alas, it was not to be. The Madonna concert was more of a spectacle really. An incredible, impressive, astounding spectacle, but really we were all just there to watch in awe and amazement as she showed us how toned, fit. sexy, daring and energetic she is, despite her age.
Don’t get me wrong, it was incredible. It was slicker than slick, and it was perfectly executed. But it wasn’t what I, and I think most of the other punters, wanted.
Forget the flying half-naked dancers and the pom-pom girls and the fireworks and the incredible graphics. What we longed for was ‘Material Girl’ or ‘True Blue’ or even ‘La Isla Bonita’. We got ‘Like a Virgin’ in a sort of hideous slow motion version that we all thought must speed up soon. And we got ‘Vogue’ and ‘Like a Prayer’ in the versions we know and love. But that was it. Added to which she showed up at ten to eleven. And the doors opened at seven.
Which all in all I felt sent a strong signal of lack of respect for her audience, some of whom were children, or pregnant women, left standing in 40 degree heat for four hours. From a woman who taught us to respect ourselves and express ourselves I thought this was weak.
The final insult was no encore. No actually, the final insult was that they played a record of ‘Holiday’ as we were all leaving.
My husband (who sensibly stayed at home) said Madge should not be expected to sing the same old songs, she sees herself as an artist and wants to continue to grow. Agreed, but she is also a material girl, and as such should look after her audience.
And just because the Mona Lisa has been around a long time, doesn’t mean we don’t want to look at her. But I certainly won’t bother going to see Madge again, however old she gets.

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2012


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Helena Frith Powell was born in Sweden to a Swedish mother and Italian father, but grew up mainly in England. She is the author of eleven books, translated into several languages including Chinese and Russian. She wrote the French Mistress column The Sunday Times about life in France for several years. She is a regular contributor to the Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday, The Times, Daily Telegraph, Tatler Magazine and Harper’s Bazaar.

Helena has been the editor of four magazines, including M Magazine, a supplement for the Abu Dhabi based National Newspaper and FIVE, a high-end fashion glossy, also published in Abu Dhabi. Helena was also editor in chief of 360 Life, a quarterly glossy magazine published with the Sports 360 Newspaper in Dubai, part of the Chalhoub Group.

Helena contributes regularly to UK-based newspapers and magazines and holds a Masters in Creative Writing from the University of Cambridge. Helena is also working on a thriller called Thin Ice that will be published in spring 2021 as well as a novel about the relationship between Virginia Woolf and Katherine Mansfield called Sense of an Echo.

Her latest non-fiction work Smart Women Don’t Get Wrinkles came out in hardback in 2016 and in paperback in April 2018.

Helena, who was educated at Durham University, lives in the Languedoc region of France with her husband Rupert and their three children.

Bibliography

More France Please, we’re British; Gibson Square 2004

Two Lipsticks and a Lover 2005; Gibson Square (hardback)

All You Need to be Impossibly French; (US version of above) Penguin 2006

Two Lipsticks and a Lover; Arrow Books (paperback) 2007

Ciao Bella Gibson Square; (hardback) 2006

Ciao Bella Gibson Square; (paperback) 2007

So Chic! (French version of Two Lipsticks) Leduc Editions 2008 (also translated into Chinese, Russian and Thai)

More, More France; Gibson Square 2009

To Hell in High Heels; Arrow Books 2009 (also translated into Polish)

The Viva Mayr Diet; Harper Collins 2009

Love in a Warm Climate; Gibson Square 2011

The Ex-Factor; Gibson Square 2013

Smart Women Don’t Get Wrinkles; Gibson Square 2016

The Arnolfini Marriage; Amazon Kindle December 2016

Smart Women Don’t Get Wrinkles (paperback); Gibson Square spring 2018

The Longest Night; Gibson Square spring 2019

 

 

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