“Love Is A Battlefield” As Forerunner to “Papa Don’t Preach”

It’s slightly uncanny that, in the early pre-fame days of Madonna’s career, her first manager, Camille Barbone, was grooming her to look and sound more like Pat Benatar rather than the “disco dolly” she would get accused of being once her first record came out. But while Barbone was sinking all of her cash into the manufacturing of this “rocker chick” persona for Madonna, the latter was instead perfecting her recording of a club-oriented dance track called “Everybody” with Stephen Bray. Never mind that Bray would soon after be betrayed by Madonna when she instead handed the track over to Mark Kamins for a producer credit, as he was the one who got the demo into the hands of Sire Records’ Seymour Stein. So it was that Madonna’s musical path was officially set apart from Benatar’s, with “Everybody” released as a single in October of 1982. A year later, Benatar would come out with “Love Is A Battlefield.”

Although the song bears no auditory similarities to “Papa Don’t Preach” (a 1986 single of Madonna’s that would prove to be one of her most controversial, therefore best-selling), the video concept behind it certainly does. Commencing with intercut shots of Benatar on a bus traveling from Clinton, New Jersey to New York City with shots of her roaming the then big, bad streets of Times Square, the motif established is that she feels somehow safer in the dangerous wilds of NY than she does amid the judgments thrust upon her at home. Singing, “We are young/Heartache to heartache we stand/No promises, no demands,” Benatar means what she says—and aims to stand by it no matter the cost. Even getting kicked out of her father’s house as her mother and brother watch it happen in helpless silence.

Directed by Bob Giraldi, the video was also known for being among the first to use dialogue, even if minimally. It starts as Benatar sings her lyrics, “We are strong!” to which her father warns, “You leave this house now…” Benatar keeps singing, “No one can tell us we’re wrong.” But her father concludes, “…you can just forget about comin’ back!” Thus, Benatar flees the white-picket prison in favor of seedier pastures, landing a job as a taxi dancer at one of the dance halls she happens upon (presumably during her nighttime street wanderings). The defiance in Benatar’s actions is reminiscent not only of Madonna’s real-life rebellion against her own father, Silvio “Tony” Ciccone, but the one that occurs in “Papa Don’t Preach,” with Danny Aiello portraying her stern Italian-American patriarch. Like “Love Is A Battlefield,” “Papa Don’t Preach” was also shot in New York, specifically Staten Island (which many consider to be a separate entity from NYC, but anyway…). Addressing the Electra complex nature of father-daughter relationships more glaringly, the crux of the conflict in “Papa Don’t Preach” isn’t just that Madonna has gotten knocked up by her hot mechanic boyfriend (played by Alex McArthur), but that she’s moved away entirely from seeing her father as “the world,” instead gravitating toward another man. One of many who will try to take his place as the years go by and “teenage” Madonna continues to grow up. In Benatar’s scenario, the rebellion is less about breaking away to bone some guy, and more about leaning into the identity she wants to carve out for herself, independent of paternal input.

As part of that independence, Benatar sees fit to spread her message of defiance to the other taxi dancers she befriends at the club. This isn’t done so much with words, but rather, standing up with a death stare to the club’s owner (played by Philip Cruise), which then, naturally, leads into a one-sided dance-off from Benatar and her allegiant followers. In true unapologetic 80s fashion. Apparently, the moves are so disarming that the owner decides to back off, clutching to the bar in terror. For what could be scarier than women declaring their autonomy through bodily movement? Their escalating choreo bombast sends the owner into submission, except for that moment when Benatar screams, “We are young!” and he appears especially disgusted by the statement. Chalk it up to “youth panic” perhaps, as he feels himself outnumbered by all these unruly “children.” And although he briefly tries to surrender by joining in with their dance, Benatar isn’t having it, dousing his face with a glass of water and liberating the dancers all the more by leading them outside. Into the light.

In contrast, Madonna’s character in “Papa Don’t Preach” is more quietly uncontrollable, her upbringing decidedly more repressed (if you can believe it) than Benatar’s in “Love Is A Battlefield.” Which is why it takes her so long to build up the courage to confess her pregnancy to “Papa,” wandering the dilapidated environs of Staten Island (captured with “working-class fetish” brilliance by director James Foley) before finally returning home to tell him she’s “with child.” When she does, the reaction is just as she feared: hostile silent treatment. Better known as: a Catholic father superpower. After an unspecified amount of time has passed, with father and daughter retreating to their respective “corners of the ring” (emphasized by them being on opposite sides of a dividing wall), her dad finally accepts the news and embraces her both literally and figuratively.

Benatar, on the other hand, doesn’t seem to be as lucky. For, at the end of “Love Is A Battlefield,” although she’s on a bus again, it’s not necessarily certain that she’s capitulated to returning home, but rather, she’s probably headed to another place where she can disappear into the crowd, free of her disapproving father, who told her not to ever come back anyway. In this regard, the video’s premise is also reminiscent of Bronski Beat’s “Smalltown Boy,” which was released in 1984. So something was definitely in the air with disappointed, disavowing fathers during this decade.

While the connection between Madonna and Benatar isn’t always acknowledged via these two videos, it’s undeniably there. And, considering Madonna had spent plenty of time practicing how to “be” Benatar under Gotham Management, maybe the influence kept lingering subtly in her 80s-era subconscious. To further tie the two together, Madonna’s erstwhile boyfriend, Jellybean Benitez, even produced a dance mix version of “Love Is A Battlefield.” By the time “Papa Don’t Preach” was released, however, he would no longer be Madonna’s “boy toy”—for she decided not to keep his particular baby.