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Madonna has been on holiday since closing her Celebration Tour with a rapturous, free beachside concert in Rio that was attended by 1.6 million people. It remains fascinating to me that she actually started the Rio show, which again was free, within an hour of the scheduled start time. 50 minutes late is basically early in Madonna math. But though the tour is over, the lawsuits are still chugging along. Madonna has been sued by fans for starting the show egregiously late (2-3 hours) not once, not twice, but thrice. The first suit was filed in January in relation to a Brooklyn tour stop last December, and apparently the lawyers from both parties have been engaging in a little tête-à-tête recently. Per Billboard:
Over the weekend, the dueling teams of lawyers engaged in a bizarre back and forth. On Friday (June 7), attorneys for the accusers told the judge that the two sides had “reached a settlement” that would end the case. But first thing on Monday morning (June 10), Madonna’s legal team emphatically denied that any such deal had been reached: “The parties have not settled this matter.”
“To be clear, defendants are not necessarily opposed to settlement if certain terms can be reached,” wrote Jeff Warshafsky, a partner at the firm Proskauer who reps Madonna and Live Nation. “But defendants will not be harassed into settlement and cannot abide false statements made to the court.”
In the filing, Madonna’s lawyer said the two sides had “discussed the possibility of settlement” but that they had “made no settlement offer” and “we do not know what plaintiffs believe they are accomplishing or trying to accomplish with the false notice.”
“The false notice is part and parcel of the harassment campaign that plaintiffs’ counsel has been waging against defendants over the last several months in hopes of extorting a lucrative settlement by forcing defendants to incur unnecessary legal fees,” Warshafsky wrote. “Whatever plaintiffs’ motive … defendants believe plaintiffs’ complaint is completely without merit and intend to fully defend themselves.”
An attorney for Madonna’s accusers did not immediately return a request for comment.
Madonna and Live Nation were first sued in January over the Brooklyn shows — a case that made headlines because it claimed the fans “had to get up early to go to work” the next day. She was later hit with a similar case in Washington, D.C. that claimed fans had waited in an “uncomfortably hot” arena and that she had lip-synched portions of the show. A third case, filed last month, echoed those claims but also alleged that Madonna’s show had been unexpectedly “pornographic.”
All three cases have been filed as class actions, seeking to represent potentially thousands of other fans who also faced the alleged delays. By starting the concerts later than expected, the cases claim Madonna and Live Nation breached their contracts with fans and violated state consumer protection laws.
Madonna’s attorneys have strongly rejected those accusations. In a request to dismiss the New York case earlier this year, her lawyers argued that simply needing to wake up early was not the kind of “cognizable injury” that can form the basis for a lawsuit. And they say that anyone buying a concert ticket is well aware that a show likely won’t start at the exact time printed on the ticket.
“No reasonable concertgoer — and certainly no Madonna fan — would expect the headline act at a major arena concert to take the stage at the ticketed event time,” her legal team wrote in April.
A version of that motion to dismiss the case remains pending. With no settlement reached, a response from Madonna’s accusers is due on July 1.
Plaintiffs’ attorney: “We believe we have reached a settlement.” Madonna’s attorney: “This is harassment!!!!” That’s the gist of it, right? From the time the first case was filed, Madonna’s lawyers have tended towards the hyperbolic. The initial rebuttal was that they’d be defending her “vigorously!” … and then what is the defense? “No reasonable concertgoer — and certainly no Madonna fan — would expect the headline act at a major arena concert to take the stage at the ticketed event time.” Bitch, she’s Madonna, she doesn’t have to justify her lateness! True Madonna fans know this! With all due respect, Mr. Warshafsky, even Elle Woods would come up with a more substantial argument than that.
So by my calculations, the “celebration” in the tour remains to be, at least from the audience’s perspective, the fact that Madonna took the stage at all, and that they survived the inhumane roasting in the un-air conditioned, densely packed arena. Madonna — pushing her fans over the borderline… of patience.
Photos credit: J King/Dilson Silva/Backgrid and via Instagram
