The Truth about ”MadonnaMania”

MadonnaTribe Team Member Tonybecks had the chance to be at the recording of Granada TV’s ‘Madonna Mania‘ show which is due to be broadcast sometime in April on ITV and is bringing all the exclusive details to our readers. Apparently the rumours about the cast floating around the internet were not particulary accurate as you will see.

“For those of you who don’t know the format of these shows – there have previously been “Grease Mania”, “ABBA Mania” and “Motown Mania” where they get some pop stars to come in and sing the biggest hits from that particular special. Usually it’s just a bit of harmless fun. Madonna Mania is the latest in this occasional series.

First off – as this entire production got one mention on Madonnalicious with only the vaguest of details it shows how low-key it was kept. Why this kind of show isn’t made available to the fan-club is beyond me – surely if they want a decent audience it makes sense to have fans of the act making up the audience rather than any random person who signed up for Trisha tickets?! Anyway, I digress…

So, the show was filmed at the Wembley ITV studios and was presented by former Arsenal and England footballer Ian Wright. For his inbetween song bits he rolled out the usual career stats and milestones. Apparently there will also be little video interludes but we didn’t see those. The set was a typical flashy Saturday night type set made of reflective metal surfaces and various screens and staircases. They kinda took the Like A Prayer ‘crown’ logo and fiddled with it a bit for the Madonna Mania logo which appeared all the time.

First act on was….*drum roll*… Pop Idol reject and UK Eurovision Entry Javine who did a fairly decent mimed version of Vogue. Now, she was dressed in a Virgin era white corset, but hey, she’s young and fit and pulled it off pretty well. The dancers (and there were about 20) were *excellent* – I know, who knew – and it seems whoever choreograhed this song has studied all three tour versions of the song and made a frenetic choreography of it mixing all three. Bravo – not a bad start considering.

Next up was Welsh opera newcomer Katherine Jenkins who did an interesting half-pop half-opera version of Frozen. But fair play to the girl, she sang it live and she looked fab. But still, Madonna and opera don’t really go too well.

After that it was downhill all the way.

Next up was Nikki Sanderson (who I’m reliably informed plays ‘Candice Stowe’ on the Coronation Street) who did a dodgy version of Material Girl. It was bad, but she had pre-recorded her vocals which weren’t too horrific.

Next up were Liberty X who, to their credit, have done a few decent tunes, but are so undeserving of covering Like A Prayer that it isn’t even funny. However, the girls did a decent job of it, and the choir they roped in to decorate the set added some beef, but the lads just looked horribly embarrassed to be there. They all looked nice though. LOL

Next up was another soap “stunna” – some chick out of Emmerdale who I’m afraid I can’t remember the name of and therefore can’t show you a pic of. Anyway, she did a version of Papa Don’t Preach with some extremely tasty dancers, based loosely on the Blond Ambition dance routine, but without the ballet rubbish at the end.

After that, was a moment, that if I ever had to relive would reduce me to a sobbing mess.

Read these words to yourself, then read them again and try to imagine the horror that was : G4 singing Crazy For You…and how can they top that?

By “treating” us to our second Corrie actress of the night – yes, and from Bad Girls too – Debra Stephenson who murdered Music. No really, murdered it. She is fresh out of the Comic Relief Fame Academy thing so we all know she can’t sing. She did have one of the sexiest dancers alive with her though, so she’s forgiven

Finally (LOL – yes, that was everyone) they all came back onstage to murder Holiday amongst lots of flashy fireworks and ticker tape. Bet you’re gutted you missed it, eh? Make sure you tune in in April to spot me looking horrified, embarrassed, close to tears, attempting something that might loosely be termed dancing, and quite a bit of dancer-perving in my Italians do it better T-shirt.

So…after that, a few Spice Girls or a Minogue or two wouldn’t have been so bad after all, eh?”

Thanks to Nikki for the mobile pic of the logo
Full review originally posted on MadonnaTribe’s Forum
Update: Our forum member Lisa463 informs us that the broadcast date on ITV has been apparently set for April 16.