Sunday Night Live: Who Was That Girl?

Occasionally in a live performance there's a moment, something indefinable, a split second when the show turns from something really good into something you'll never forget. In this fairly old Madonna performance, the moment (for me anyway) comes just past the 5-minute mark. Your mileage may vary, as they say, but that's when it hits for me - just the combination of the music, the energy, the crowd, the feeling that for the folks on stage this isn't just another night on the road.

This particular performance is from Madonna's "Who's That Girl?" tour from the summer of 1987, specifically one of the final nights of the tour when she played to about 70,000 people in Torino. The Italian government aired the whole thing live on Rai Uno, reportedly to prevent a mass influx of people to the country's north, and this is a rare unedited clip from that broadcast (other versions are available, but they're mashed up with performances from Florence and Tokyo).

It's strange to look back over a distance of twenty years and realize how controversial Madonna was at the time, how absolutely dangerous. Her frontal assaults on traditional gender roles and sexual mores were shocking and, to many, threatening, and she pushed the edge whenever she could (dancing on stage in a bustier with a 13-year-old as she did in the opening number on this tour wouldn't raise an eyebrow these days, but in 1987 it was quite the little scandal).

Madonna fans tend to treat her "Who's That Girl?" tour the same way Star Wars fans treat Return of the Jedi - publicly they roll their eyes at it, but privately they've got a soft spot for it. Yes, the outfits look like Andy Warhol puked all over Molly Ringwald. Yes, the choreography looks like it came from an alternate universe where Footloose is considered the apex of dance. Yes, there is ample evidence that Madonna made a wise decision in going to partly canned vocals after this tour. But the show has this goofy energy to it, and it shows her really coming into her own as a performer.

There were definitely a lot of firsts and lasts for her on this one: it was her first world tour, and the last time she was greeted quite so rapturously in Italy. It was the first time she used elaborate set pieces, and it was the last time they were so unformed and unrelated. It was the first time she was quite such a dominant presence on stage, and the last time she used purely live vocals.

It was, by her own admission, the first time she realized how big everything had gotten. And it was the last time she looked like she was really having fun.

"Into the Groove", Torino, Italy, Sep. 4th 1987. Enjoy.