On March 12, 1994, Madonna made a surprise appearance at the AIDS Dance-A-Thon benefit in San Francisco, California.
Category Archives: 1994
Today in Madonna History: December 20, 1994
On December 20 1994, Madonna attended the premiere of Ready to Wear (Pret-A-Porter).
Today in Madonna History: December 5, 1994
On December 5 1994, Madonna began filming the music video for Bedtime Story at Universal Studios in Los Angeles, CA.
The video marked her second collaboration with director Mark Romanek and featured cinematography by Harris Savides. To assist in the process of developing her ideas for the video into something more tangible, Madonna again turned to storyboard artist Grant Shaffer, who had previously collaborated on her videos for Deeper And Deeper and Rain.
Madonna recalled the inspiration for the video in an interview with Aperture magazine:
“My Bedtime Story video was completely inspired by all the female surrealist painters like Leonora Carrington and Remedios Varo. There’s that one shot where my hands are up in the air and stars are spinning around me. And me flying through the hallway with my hair trailing behind me, the birds flying out of my open robe – all of those images were an homage to female surrealist painters; there’s a little bit of Frida Kahlo in there, too.”
The effects-laden video was shot over six days and has been noted by Madonna as being one of the more grueling video shoots of her career. Filming of a scene that featured Madonna bathing in blue-coloured water yielded unexpectedly colourful results; when Madonna emerged from the water, she later recounted, it quickly became apparent that her skin had been temporarily stained blue.
Fortunately any on-set difficulties were not evident in the final product. Following several months of post-production work, the video’s stunning surrealist imagery was enthusiastically received by viewers upon its release in March, 1995.
A very special thank you to artist Grant Shaffer for generously sharing a selection of his original storyboards used in the development of the Bedtime Story video! We’d like to invite readers to check out more of Grant’s art on his official website – including his sketches for Deeper And Deeper, Rain and Madonna’s Japanese Takara commercial.
Today in Madonna History: November 29, 1994
On November 29 1994, the second single from Madonna’s Bedtime Stories album, Take A Bow, was released. The song was written and produced by Madonna and Babyface.
In Steve Sullivan’s Encyclopedia of Great Popular Song Recordings Volume 2, he reviews the hit single:
A gorgeous melancholy ballad of unrequited love, with the object of the singer’s affection being someone who hides behind a role playing mask which only she can see. Babyface makes the song virtually a duet with Madonna, echoing her words with his high tenor wafting dreamily behind her, and the song’s minimalist arrangement is impeccably elegant.
Today in Madonna History: November 23, 1994
On November 23 1994, Madonna was interviewed by Jana Lynne White at the St. James hotel in Los Angeles for Canada’s long-running, award-winning series, TheNewMusic. Jana had previously interviewed Madonna in 1992 during promotion for the Erotica album.
Today in Madonna History: November 16, 1994
On November 16 1994, Madonna began filming Four Rooms in Los Angeles.
Madonna played one of the witches, Elspeth, in the first segment of the film called, The Missing Ingredient, directed by Alison Anders. Other actresses playing witches in the coven included: Valeria Golino (Athena), Alicia Witt (Kiva), Sammi Davis (Jezebel), Lili Taylor (Raven), Ione Skye (Eva) and Amanda de Cadenet (Diana).
This beautiful illustration of Elspeth is by Sarah Hedlund Design. Check out Sarah’s Facebook and webpage to see more of her amazing work! We have published Sarah’s version of Elspeth with her permission.
Today in Madonna History: November 12, 1994
On November 12 1994, Madonna’s Bedtime Stories was the week’s highest debut on the Billboard 200 album chart, peaking at #3 with sales of 145,000 units.
While the figure represented a 15% drop in first-week sales from her previous long player, Erotica, the album proved to be a commercial grower in America – where the runaway success of its second single, Take A Bow, would push its overall U.S. sales tally well beyond that of its predecessor.
Underscoring urban/r&b music’s U.S. chart domination at the time, Bedtime Stories was held back from the top spot by the Murder Was The Case soundtrack (performed by Snoop Doggy Dogg) and Boyz II Men’s II.
