Nothing would have happened today. No one is shocked to hear swear words or insults in the media anymore. Celebrities can swear and talk openly about sex without any repercussions. That was not the case on March 31, 1994. Madonna’s visit to David Letterman’s “Late Show” went down in history as the most censored episode of American television’s “talk shows.” In the 20 minute interview, the diva said the forbidden word 13 times: FUCK. That evening, the queen of controversy asked the presenter to smell his used underwear or asked him if he had ever urinated while taking a shower. While quietly smoking a cigar.
“Why are you so obsessed with my sex life?” »
It was Madonna’s first appearance on American television after the outcry over her 1992 book “Sex” and her 1992 album “Erotica”. A long-awaited visit from David Letterman who, from the start, took an insolent tone with her introduction: “Our first guest tonight is one of the biggest stars in the world. Over the past 10 years, she has sold over 80 million albums, starred in countless films and He’s slept with some of the biggest names in the entertainment industry.”
Madonna at her SEX book launch party in 1992. / Ron Galella, Ltd./Ron Galella Collection via Getty Images
Con Vacation playing in the background, the pop diva entered. Smiling. Slicked black short hair. Also dressed in black. and the 20 minutes of swearing, sexual innuendo or double meanings. It was Letterman who started the interview with an inappropriate request: “Go kiss a guy in the audience. You’ll knock him out.” She refused him: “I never succumb to pressure”. And I ask”Why are you so obsessed with my sex life?”
“I gave him my underwear and he won’t feel it!”
Madonna, falling silent in 1994 / Vinnie Zuffante/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
Prior to the show, Madonna had given Letterman a pair of used underwear and continually begged him to know why he hadn’t smelled them yet.. “Wait a minute, aren’t you going to feel them then?”, to which he replied: “I’ll deal with it later. She complains to the audience: “I gave him my underwear and he won’t feel it!”
That night, David Letterman’s show kept 9 million stunned viewers glued to the screen. Among the highest indexes ever obtained
Madonna, who spent much of the interview smoking a cigar, asked the presenter if he had ever urinated in the shower, assuring that it was a wonderful antiseptic against fungal infections of the feet. And in what seemed like a strange revelation, she turned to him saying: “By the way, you’re fucking sick. I don’t know why I get so much shit.”
The conversation was peppered with awkward back and forth and up to 13 ‘fuck’ have been counted, among other profanities, all conveniently censored “covered” with beeps. “People don’t want to hear those swear words in their homes at 11:30 p.m..” says the popular comedian. But it wasn’t like that. The audience soared: that evening, the David Letterman show kept 9 million stunned viewers glued to the screen. Among the highest indexes ever obtained.
David Letterman and Madonna / Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic
Instantly, it became a legendary “late night” everyone was talking about. Even actor Robin Williams described the reunion as “a battle of wits with an unarmed woman”. Critics commented that the singer had hit “her lowest point”, and the Federal Communications Commission received numerous complaints about the language used on the show.
“I felt very gangsta”
Raquel Welch, Madonna and Tupac Shakur at the Interview magazine party in March 1994. / Patrick McMullan/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images
Madonna, however, defended her language and behavior as a failed attempt to stand up to television censorship. “Can you blow up a person and you can’t even say ‘shit’?” revealed in Spin magazine in 1995. “superb hypocrisy. The fact that everyone counted how many “fucks” I said gives some idea of how narrow-minded they are, doesn’t it? The way you introduced me was pejorativeAll I did was say ‘Okay, if that’s what you want to play, you’re not going to beat me in this game.
In 2015, the artist made another confession to Howard Stern: “I once went crazy on the Letterman show when I said the word ‘fuck’ a bunch of times. I was in a weird mood that that day. I was dating Tupac Shakur and it changed my whole life. So when I went to the show, I felt very gangsta.”