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Madonna and France


Roland Barthes

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Madonna enduring love affair with all things french

Madonna and France

Madonna was born to Sylvio (Tony) Ciccone a first generation son of italian migrants from Pacentro in Italy and Madonna Fortin Ciccone an american of french canadian descent.
Her french ancestor is Julien Fortin (known as Bellefontaine) left Saint Cosme en Varais (Perche) in 1650 for New England.
In 1714 he married Anne Bossé in Cap Saint Ignace, QC. They gave birth to Claude Fortin the ancestor of Elsie Fortin the grand mother of Madonna
In 1735 he married for the second time with Madeleine Langelier, their Son augustin is the ancestor of Madonna's grand-father Willard.
In 2000 Mirwais said during an interview about Paradise (not for me) that the broken french she speaks in the song is written by her and he did not want to correct because
she told him that's how she spoke with her grandma Elsie growing up after her mother died.
Her second name is french : Louise and some of her siblings call her that since she became a superstar and the name Madonna a brand.
When she was a starving dancer in New York in 1978, she auditionned for Jean Van Lieu and Claude Pellerin the producers of french disco sensation Patrick Hernandez
During her audition they asked her to sing which she did not expect (she was already living with the Gilroy brothers but only for two weeks and the Breakfast Club band
did not exist yet). She sang Jingle Bells. They decided she was too good to only dance behind Hernandez and brought her with them back to France.
She never danced for Patrick Hernandez. He confirmed this again last april in an interview. They gave her singing and acting lessons. They wanted her to be a disco singer
but she did not like the direction they wanted her to take. She wanted to learn how to write her own songs so she moved back to New York but the Paris 6 months experience (she lived Bd Courcelles near le Parc Monceau in the 17th arrondissement) planted in her head that she could be a singer which she did not envisionned until then.
She met Maripol during a Fab Five Freddy concert when her future stylist asked her if she had a nice bra and minded remove her top to go on stage with Freddy. Maripol is a french migrant of moroccan descent who with her italian husband Edo Bertoglio were at the center of the east village art scene. Maripol was her first stylist and together they created and refined the "Madonna look" of her early years.
She's also the godmother of her son.
1986 Open your Heart video with Mondino
August 1987. Madonna first concert in France takes the country by storm. It's still the biggest paying concert with the biggest attendance in France. She played for 150 000 in a field in Sceaux in the outskirts of Paris.
The media went Madonna crazy for a week. She was given the keys to Paris by then mayor Chirac and she gave her salary for the show to "Les artistes contre le sida" a new association created to fight Aids
inspired by AMFAR. It was later rebranded Sidaction. She was the first artist to support the association.
1990. She hires Jean Paul Gaultier to create the costumes for the Blond Ambition tour. Shoots Justify My Love at the Royal Monceau Palace.
1991. Cannes filmfestival is hijacked by Madonna, she creates another media storm when she presents her movie "Truth or dare : in bed with Madonna", Cannes and the whole country are watching her walk the red carpet and steps of Le Palais des festivals
1992. Fabien Baron designs the sex book
1996. She names her daughter Lourdes Maria in honour of the frech city of miracles, a place her mother wanted to visit before her early death.
2000. She hires Mirwais to co-produce her album Music, the french producer, son of afghani refugees was an obscur producer then, he used to be in an underground band in the late 70's, Taxi girl.Mondino shoots the album cover. in 2003 he will co-produce American life and in 2005 some tracks on Confessions on a dancefloor.
Her kids go to the lycée français (de Gaulle) in London and Los Angeles, her kids are fluent in french.
2006/15 She starts hiring more and more french back up dancers for her tours they also become close to her family especially her kids (Norman). More french dancers in Sticky and sweet and even more on MDNA (Brahim, Valerie, Emily, Yaman, Marvin, Loic, Adrien....)
She attacks Marine Le Pen during her shows and on Instagram for being racist. She plays the Olympia, covers Gainsbourg, works with Martin Solveig, pays tribute to the victims of Charlie Hebdo and Hypercacher
Her covers of Brel 's If you go away and Charles Trenet's boom leak online.
She covers La vie en Rose during her tour, pays tribut to the Victims of the november 13th terrorist attacks by singing a few songs with her son David and Monte on Place de la République at equal distance of the Bataclan and Cafes were people were killed.
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Madonna definitely has a lot of love for France. I think she has the same love for Italy due to her father being Italian and her mother being French Canadian. Natural kind of appreciation and love that continues to keep growing over time.

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Every summer I was in France, you could tell her presence was everywhere. More so than any other country I can think of.... maybe UK 2000-2006

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