On June 23 1990, Madonna’s I’m Breathless: Music from and Inspired by the Film Dick Tracy hit #2 on the Billboard Top 200 Albums Chart in the USA.
After the filming of Dick Tracy was complete, Madonna began work on the film’s soundtrack, with songwriter Stephen Sondheim, producer Patrick Leonard and engineer Bill Bottrell. She also worked with producer Shep Pettibone on the album’s first single, Vogue. The album was recorded within three weeks in California.
On May 1, 1990, Madonna was a guest on the Arsenio Hall Show. During her appearance, Madonna promoted Dick Tracy and made Arsenio sweat about Paula Abdul, etc.
On July 15 1990, Madonna’s Hanky Panky single was released in the UK.
On October 22 1990, Madonna was featured in a public service announcement on MTV’s Rock The Vote in which she was wrapped in the US flag and urged young people to register and vote; the ad caused a controversy with US Veterans of Foreign Wars who were enraged by Madonna’s provocative use of the American flag and said that it bordered on desecration.
On September 19 1990, Madonna’s Hanky Panky was certified gold (for shipment of 500,000 units) in the USA.
During an interview with Rolling Stone, Madonna talked about getting a good “spanky”:
The spanking thing started because I believed that my character in Dick Tracy liked to get smacked around and that’s why she hung around with people like Al Pacino’s character. Warren Beatty asked me to write some songs, one of them, the Hanky Panky song, was about that. I say in the song ‘Nothing like a good spanky’, and in the middle I say, ‘Ooh, my bottom hurts just thinking about it’. When it came out everybody started asking, ‘Do you like to get spanked?’ and I said: ‘Yeah. Yeah, I do’.
On August 25 1990, Hanky Panky peaked at #18 on the Canadian Top 100 Singles chart (RPM). At the time it was Madonna’s lowest charting Canadian single since Borderline‘s peak of #25 in September, 1984. A handful of later releases would subsequently peak lower on the same chart, however, including Bad Girl (#20 – 1993), Bedtime Story (#46 – 1995) and Human Nature (#64 – 1995).
On June 22 1990, the second and final single from Madonna’s I’m Breathless album, Hanky Panky, was released in North America.
Greg Sandow, from Entertainment Weekly, called the song a “delightful challenge to censorship”.
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