There was no denying that most of the 1980s were defined by the music of Madonna. Over the course of four albums, she had redefined what it meant to be a popstar and ended with her arguable peak with the confessional “Like a Prayer.” It was a record searing with personal detail that elevated her to something greater. She wasn’t just going to be making provocative music. She was going to use it to explore every issue imaginable whether it be her abusive ex-husband Sean Penn, a conflicted relationship with her dad, or even the idea of becoming a mother. By the end of the decade, she opened the floodgates for singers every. They were allowed to be as openly vulnerable, reflecting every inner desire that women had but weren’t socially allowed to face.
But what was the next act? Coming into 1990, her career was on an upswing with the Blond Ambition Tour, having gained as much acclaim as notoriety. She had controversial mixtures of religion and sex in her live shows, causing Pope John Paul II to have people boycott her work as well as promoters like Kentucky Fried Chicken. She was doing something that was reminiscent of her Who’s That Girl? Tour from a few years prior. This wasn’t just promoting her latest album, but also a movie.
In the case of the Blond Ambition Tour, that was Dick Tracy (1990). Anyone who notices patterns may think that this was going to be a trainwreck. Her acting career hadn’t yet taken off, with more Razzie Awards than Oscars to her credit. What was going to be different this time around?
This may not seem so obvious when you hear about how she became involved with the Warren Beatty-directed and starring blockbuster. Since she was dating him at the time, she assumed that he would ask her to star in the film eventually. When this didn’t happen, she volunteered to work for scale as to not appear as favoritism. She went one step further and decided to produce the music herself. After starring in the film as Breathless Mahoney, she went off to record the music, which included collaborations with Mandy Patinkin, Beatty, and Stephen Sondheim.
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The biggest reason that Dick Tracy worked as a Madonna vehicle better than Who’s That Girl? (1987) was her collaborators. By this point in his career, Beatty was accomplished as a director, coming off of an Oscar win for Reds (1981). The team also featured Al Pacino as well as one of the most high profile examples of movie marketing that year. It was in response to Batman (1989), which had become a cultural phenomenon the year prior and would popularize the comic book genre. Considering that the sets used matte paintings with cartoonish proportions, it was easy to see how Madonna fit into this world, especially after Who’s That Girl? found her starring as the one cartoon character where she didn’t belong.
While she had music that was featured prominently in the film, Warner Bros. decided to let her record a whole album. They figured that it would be a good enough use of cross-promotion and allowed her to perform songs while in character as Breathless Mahoney (thus the title “I’m Breathless”). Considering that Dick Tracy was a throwback to the serials of the 1930s, it was only right that the soundtrack featured incorporation of jazz and swing into the sound. Madonna’s range would be stretched even further, managing to incorporate everything from her deep sultry tones to something higher-pitched, more reminiscent of Betty Boop.
If there are any complaints to be had with the album, it’s easily her most impersonal. Considering that “True Blue” and “Like a Prayer” (even “Who’s That Girl?” for that matter) featured her tackling serious issues through pop, it’s easy to find this cartoonish diversion a bit underwhelming. Very little of the record could be taken seriously, serving more as a concept album for a street hooker who witnesses Dick Tracy roaming around the streets, fighting crime. Sometimes she’s onstage, performing a cabaret act. Others she’s into some goofy S&M. As a whole, this was at best a parody of what a Madonna record would sound like when generated through Beatty’s already warped perspective.
That isn’t to say that it’s bad. If anything, it’s just another form of performance art for Madonna to chew into. With collaborators like Sondheim writing three songs, there was already a high caliber of talent attached to make the music a better quality than you’d expect. It was by no means her best work, but if you wanted to believe that she had range, then this was as much a signifier of her talent as anything else.
The first song, “He’s a Man” comes with audio samples from the film presented in an Untouchables-style crime-fighting story. It’s establishing the world with this mystery that sought to make the trench coat nature of the story exciting and fun. You bought into the chill of the night air, with many comparing her to a hooker in this scene. Considering that the next song “Sooner or Later” found her getting into a jazzier vibe, you would be allowed to assume that this would be a more mellow, painstaking album that came from her soul. As the first Sondheim song, it captured the ethos of the story (“I always get my man”) from the perspective of a woman seeking that pleasure.
However, that is only part of the bigger puzzle when looking at the world of Dick Tracy. Did I mention that a lot of the aspects of the film are cartoonish? “Hanky Panky” may be the most directly sexual, managing to find comical ways to explore Breathless’ love of being “slapped around” with outright naughty behavior such as “spanky.” It’s wild, Betty Boop-style kitsch that when paired with the Carmen Miranda inspired “I’m Going Bananas” (get it?) makes you see the pop singer embracing a sillier side. She hadn’t really winked at the camera through a song before, and that was the one feature of this strange detour. Along with “Crybaby” about a man who was always crying (sniffling sound effects and all), this record was a walking Andy Warhol painting, tongue firmly in cheek.
Beatty even appeared in a two-part duet called “Now I’m Following You,” which starts in the conventional style before entering a subversive 90s approach. “Part I” is classical, finding them joyfully singing in the jazzy style that the rest of the album was based in. It is broken up by a tap number before entering “Part II.” It’s here that may as well be considered a remix, as Beatty’s Al Jolson impersonation is broken into its own bopping, horn-like instrument as the song enters more of a pop quality, serving as modern dance than era-appropriate sound. It was the comment that “I’m Breathless” needed to show how it was advancing each medium.
Though if you’re being honest with yourself, there is one song and one song only on here that you’re likely going to come away remembering. It doesn’t seem like it would belong on a Dick Tracy-inspired album, and yet here it is. The song was produced cheaply for about $5000 and recorded quickly before Madonna took a crack at the lyrics. Much like the film, it owed a lot of its existence to artists of yesteryear, featuring over a dozen references to everyone from Ginger Rogers to Marilyn Monroe. No, it wasn’t the Oscar-winning “Sooner or Later,” but a song that was originally contemplated to be on “Like a Prayer” for potentially better commercial success. It was a song that would come to define Madonna’s career…
Ladies and gentlemen… “Vogue!”
Yes, “Vogue” is forever tied to Dick Tracy just by coincidence. Was it a measure to make sure that “I’m Breathless” sold better? It wasn’t entirely tonally appropriate to the bigger project. However, it was the revolutionary mark that she needed to throw the attention back to her.
The song was based on a popular dance in the ballroom community that asked dancers to “strike a pose.” As later depicted in the series Pose, the song helped to bring the dance to the mainstream, allowing the largely queer culture to feel an acceptance that they hadn’t before. Madonna’s choice to sing about how anyone could do the dance secretly became an anthem of acceptance. It also helped to popularize disco after a lackluster decade and was partially responsible for introducing house music to the public.
The video was Madonna’s third collaboration with David Fincher and found her dancing in a black-and-white video opposite an art deco setting. The imagery has since become iconic. The song has become one of her signature songs, with many outlets considering the video to be one of the greatest ever filmed. It inspired a new generation of pop stars to be more open and inclusive with their sound, which can be seen in the works of Ariana Grande and Lady Gaga. The video was so popular that it became Madonna’s fourth video on YouTube to have over 100 million views, thus making her the first female pop artist to achieve it. Similarly, Madonna’s performance of “Vogue” at the MTV Video Music Awards where she dressed as Marie Antoinette ranks as one of the most memorable performances in the award show’s history for how it incorporated the dance into the routine.
For what it’s worth, Dick Tracy did pretty well for itself at the box office. It was the ninth-highest grossing movie of 1990. It would also receive some of Madonna’s most positive reviews for acting in her entire career. While she sang the Oscar-winning song “Sooner or Later,” she didn’t actually win. The honor went to Sondheim. Even then, her performance was once again memorable. Having appeared at the ceremony with date Michael Jackson, she performed in $20 million dollars of jewelry and a Bob Mackie dress while imitating Marilyn Monroe. The segment was memorable due to a technical glitch that kept the microphone from rising, resulting in a stagehand having to rush a microphone out to her. That didn’t stop it from winning fans over. It was perfectly nostalgic.
As was the case before, The Blond Ambition Tour used “I’m Breathless” as a victory lap of sorts. Even with more acclaim and effort put into the album, it was always seen as secondary to its predecessor. Sure “Sooner or Later” and “Vogue” were big hits, but they couldn’t compare to the zeitgeist-defining “Like a Prayer.” As a result, the songs felt swapped into the bigger show. Even then, it’s fun to know that even a decade later she was still willing to perform “Hanky Panky,” this time in the guise of a showgirl.
It’s telling that the biggest thing to come from her work on Dick Tracy had nothing to do with Dick Tracy at all. Nobody was vogueing in 1930. It feels tacked on to an album that’s largely a novelty in her career. Even if it lacks the deeper heart and personality of her best work, it still managed to prove why she was an icon, an entertainer who always rose to the occasion. She used her platform to popularize an underground dance trend that hasn’t gone away. She could perform it at Super Bowl XLVI and get the crowd moving like they did 21 years prior. That’s how timeless the song was.
There was so much confidence of this being a commemorative moment for Madonna that the same year would find her releasing the greatest hits collection “The Immaculate Collection,” featuring even more original songs like “Justify My Love” and “Rescue Me.” With that said, it’s weird that she didn’t choose here for “Vogue” to premiere instead of “I’m Breathless,” but what do I know about marketing? “The Immaculate Collection” charted better and sold 10 million copies, anyways.
“I’m Breathless” may be the most indicative of where Madonna wanted to be in her career for the decade to come. It was a moment where she was a movie star as well as dominating the charts, proving that the world was still obsessed with her. It’s tough to call this inaccurate, though it fails to properly represent the reality. Madonna got lucky, finding a project that perfectly suited her kitschy ways. It helped that her collaborators were also arguably the most talented group that she’d ever work with. This was the first move in altering her image as an all-out dominant force in the 90s. Up next was her return to more serious matters with “Erotica,” which would do everything in its power to make “Hanky Panky” look childish by comparison.
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