[Chapter 20: South by Southwest]
Flying from Miami to Austin was about the same distance as flying from New York to Miami. Orlando arrived in Austin around two in the afternoon.
He hadn't been at the hotel the SXSW organizers had booked for him long before a call came in from Washington, D.C. After he finished the call, Frank and Jason saw a look of relief on Orlando's face.
"Was that Ms. Cuomo?" Frank asked quietly.
Orlando nodded. "Yes."
Frank didn't press. Orlando thought about the call for a moment and then said casually, "Daisy set me up with a tax whiz on Wall Street. I'll meet him when I'm back in New York."
Besides that, Daisy Cuomo had told him on the phone that she planned to run in the midterm this year for a New York City Council seat in Queens. If things went well, next year he would have to call her Councilwoman Daisy Cuomo.
Even thoguht she was more than a decade older than Orlando, already thirty, in politics, thirty was still very young. So she was only running for a city council seat in New York City, not for the U.S. House of Representatives.
Because of that, she also said they would need to be more discreet from now on. A thirty-two-year-old pop queen and an eighteen-year-old new singer trading rumors helped both their careers. But a thirty-year-old political up-and-comer getting cozy with an eighteen-year-old rookie would ruin her chances at the polls.
After Orlando deliberately showed some reluctance and a little irritation, Daisy reassured him. She said she didn't mind him playing the scandal game in the entertainment world, but warned him: the business had no real feelings -- it was play; don't take it seriously.
---
Soon Jason called the rest of the team over for a meeting to plan their promotional work in Austin.
First, that night Orlando would do the usual local TV interview. At noon the next day, he would take part in Madonna's rehearsal. That evening, he would go onstage and perform with Madonna. Madonna would then stage something to generate headlines and boost SXSW's buzz.
It was a marketing plan worked out between Warner and Madonna's team and the SXSW organizers. Orlando only needed to sing a song and go along with the staging, and he would easily pocket a one-million-dollar performance fee.
---
The evening interview was the same old thing -- first questions about the Old Town Road hype, then the focus shifted to his supposed fling with Madonna. To be honest, at first it had been fine, but by now Orlando was getting tired of the constant Madonna gossip. Still, his rational side told him this played to his advantage. For a little money and a lot of attention, he would tolerate it for the time being.
---
The next day at noon, when Orlando arrived at SXSW's biggest venue, the hall was temporarily closed because Madonna was rehearsing. When he and Frank entered, Madonna stood in the center giving orders. Petite at about 5' 5'', she still had an aura that commanded everyone around her.
"Don't tell me how hard it is. Tell me if you can do it or not! Can or can't! Understand?"
"I want everything. All of it, understood? Even if this is just a festival show, treat it like a tour!"
"Susan, take the venue reps and check the stage again. I want everything to be perfect!"
"Costumes, lighting, and..."
She directed her massive production like a machine, making it feel as if every detail were under her control. When she noticed Orlando arriving with his people, she clapped and dismissed the rest. "Report back in ten minutes. I'll handle this."
---
"Oh, my little boyfriend showed up?" Madonna purred as she walked over.
"I'm just here for rehearsal. For the performance, I only have Old Town Road," Orlando said.
"That's enough."
When it came to work, Madonna was serious. She dropped the teasing tone she used when she tried to steal Daisy's boy-toy.
"Tonight I'm going to sing Express Yourself. After my dance set, you come straight on and sing your song. I'll be by your side as a backing dancer. You don't need to do anything but sing your song. I'll take care of the rest."
"Just that simple?" Orlando asked skeptically.
"Just that simple," Madonna scoffed. "It's just the opening for a festival. If they weren't paying so much, I wouldn't even be here."
Orlando stayed quiet. He knew how much SXSW had paid Madonna: five million dollars. That was five times what he had been offered. Even adding up his unpaid Old Town Road royalties, endorsements, and other commercial income, he had not reached that figure yet. The pop queen truly made money.
He also knew that the five million included Madonna's endorsement fee for SXSW. Over the next year she would say many good things about the festival -- the deal was part performance, part marketing.
Orlando could sense what Madonna planned for the night. The pop star intended to have him onstage as a kind of partner in the choreography. During the backing dance she would create intimate moments to fuel the scandal, to loosen Daisy's hold on him. If anyone objected, Madonna could say it was all part of the stage performance.
But it wasn't as simple as she made it sound. "Let's get some rehearsal time. You've got to lock into my rhythm," she said.
---
The rehearsal was basically Orlando watching Madonna and her troupe run through choreography. Seeing Madonna dance live hit him differently than watching a recorded performance. This wasn't a show night -- it was practice -- and the dancers wore training outfits and executed precise, professional moves.
At the core, Madonna looked supremely confident. She sang as she moved, casually walked down the stairs, and maintained intensity in both movement and expression. Her unique blend of sexiness and tough edge coexisted in every frame.
The choreography was explicit -- hip rolls, provocative touches, peeling off clothing with seductive looks. On its face it suggested pure sexual performance. Yet in her interactions with the dancers, Madonna conveyed a narrative of female control and defiance.
It could have been lumped in with the girl-group choreography that would become common a decade or two later, but on Madonna there was a sense of female agency rather than simply being objectified. Unlike many later girl-group performances that only called attention to bodies and sex, Madonna's performance carried something more layered.
Orlando felt shaken. A familiar feeling surfaced in his head: a dance track. Inspiration hit again and he felt energized. He had already tasted the perks of a breakout song, but he only had two tracks so far -- he wished for a full hot album.
♫ I wanna hold 'em like they do in Texas, please
Fold 'em, let 'em hit me, raise it, baby, stay with me (I love it)
LoveGame intuition, play the cards with spades to start
And after he's been hooked, I'll play the one that's on his heart
Oh, whoa-oh, oh, oh
Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh
I'll get him hot, show him what I got ♫
The song was sung by a woman -- a dance track, and one that would become a huge hit later. Orlando recognized it immediately. It was Lady Gaga's Poker Face. He hadn't expected to hear it here, inspired by Madonna.
What good would that do him now, he wondered.
"That's enough," Madonna said after the run-through. "Remember this feeling. We'll do it again tonight. The most important thing is stability."
"Go rest for a bit," she added.
Then something went wrong during the break.
*****
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