As though preparing to enter battle, Madonna proceeds to throw punches at the open palms of her presumed boy toy du moment, Ahlamalik Williams (who has been one of her backup dancers since 2015’s Rebel Heart Tour). They are in her L.A. hotel room after yet another show at The Wiltern, finishing, as the lawsuit from a fan will tell you, rather late. Therefore putting the time at circa three a.m. for an ice bath. One that Madonna hovers above with her feet in the water, the setup looking very much like the sort one is placed in after their kidney is harvested against their will and they wake up post-unexpected blackout. Waiting several seconds before easing right in, her rumored to be implanted arse firmly placed on the bottom of the tub, she folds her hands together in a sort of unwitting prayer to god to let her withstand the pain. The pain that will ultimately lead to a healthier, more agile body.
Ever so slightly rocking back and forth, a dissolve to minutes later seems to indicate that M has very much adjusted to the forty-one degree temperature, at which time the opening to Kendrick Lamar’s “Humble” begins to play, sending Madonna into a fury of Arsenio Hall-inspired gestures as the lyrics, “I remember syrup sandwiches and crime allowances” punctuate the decadent yet simple nature of her “therapy.” The dichotomy of the song that played before, Rick Ross’ “B.M.F. (Blowin’ Money Fast)” seems only to further accent the contrast between the connotative divide between poor and rich. Not to mention, East Coast (or as close as it will get in this case by way of Mississippi) and West Coast. It is only the former divide that M has truly transcended.
Considering Madonna’s rare and almost always ephemeral presence on the West Coast, it seems she’s doing her best to pay subtle homage by bowing down to West Coast rap–plus, her not so secret dalliance with 2Pac has continued to gain media traction. Yet that didn’t stop her from snidely commenting in another video soon after the now strangely iconic ice bath one, “This is our first show in Los Angeles. The world’s most important city [insert implied “not!” here]. The city of illusions. The city where illusions are made. And destroyed.” So no, Madonna has never really had much affinity with California, favoring the so-called “rough-hewnness” of the corporate juggernaut that is New York. Of course, both sides of the U.S. offer different versions of a dry anal rape. Or perpetual ice bath.
With Williams, a requisite representation of the occasional friends and loved ones who remain with us through thick and thin, there to support her as she sits in freezing cold, increasingly melted ice, the metaphor of life is revealed. Not just in the all too relevant form of climate change a.ka. global warming, but in the fact that the agony of existence is something we all fear, knowing that embracing it will result only in interminable suffering yet succumbing nonetheless to the con.
Yet, like Madonna, after enough time passes, we soon take the pain as a baseline feeling. Something more a part of ourselves even than our own mind–or what’s left of it after a long enough sentence spent in the ice-filled tub called life.
Another cut to Madonna after her time in the bath shows her legs red and raw from the endeavor (though her feet, protected by socks, remain a prominent shade of white). It is then that she taunts with a cup of yellow-toned tea in hand, “It’s really good to drink urine after you get out of the bathtub.” We all need our rituals to cope with the general horreur, after all.
