The Show is Over, Say Good-Bye
The Madame X Tour show at Le Grand Rex on Sunday, 8 March was something more of a Madonna theatre show.
Following a day of uncertainties, an official statement has been published by Madonna.com:
Following official notification from the Office of the Police this morning prohibiting all events with an audience attendance of over 1000, Live Nation regrets to announce the final two Madame X performances previously re-scheduled to 10-March and 11-March are forced to be cancelled.
Tickets are refundable at point of purchase.
We regret the disappointment to fans.
Earlier yesterday customers with the VIP package – who have early access to the venue and have a backstage tour before the show begins – were informed that their entrance time was delayed to 6 PM.
Later on the fans learned that the show itself was on hold, while the organizers were waiting to see if new measures against the Covid-19 epidemic in France were going to be implemented after a meeting on the issue at the Élysée at 6 PM.
Madonna eventually took to the stage at 10:45 PM, performing the full show and ending at 1:15 AM.
In the meanwhile, the country’s health minister announced that gatherings of more than 1,000 people were banned in France in an effort to contain the outbreak. The capacity at Le Grand Rex is of 2800 people.
The news inevitably set the tone to the Madame X show and the fans were under the impression that it was going to be the final show of the tour.
Madonna herself addressed the issue – although without mentioning in a straitforward way that it was indeed her final Madame X show.
When she was getting changed behind the screen before Vogue she said:
I heard the news just before I came on stage, I can’t believe it. You know what I’m talking about, right? It just goes to show, we never know what’s in store for us or when it’s time.
And then a bit later:
I really do want to say thank you so much for tolerating me and for tolerating all the cancellations on this tour. But when you have an injury so bad that you can’t get out of bed, then you certainly can’t get up on stage and sadly that’s the way it goes.
And also:
I’m going to miss you guys. I’m going to miss performing this show every night.
It’s important to mention that no official word was heard last night – with mixed rumours about one of the remaining shows scheduled in Paris going ahead and the final one being cancelled. As the fans left the venue, most of them were under the impression that sadly they just attended the last show of the tour, and were told that an official announcement was due in a few hours.
This is what we learned last night and what we reported live on Twitter.
On Monday morning Le Grand Rex explained:
Bonjour, suite à l’annonce faite hier soir par le ministre de la santé sur l’interdiction des rassemblements de plus de 1000 personnes, nous reviendrons très vite vers vous pour savoir quelles sont les mesures à prendre.
Pour le spectacle de Madonna un communiqué officiel de Live Nation sera publié
Nous sommes, comme vous, encore dans le flou et nous attendons les directives.
Merci de votre compréhension.
L’équipe du Grand Rex
We have been waiting for a while to publish our usual report about last night’s show, hoping we could inform the fans of an official statement that was still to come. Here you have the facts as the story developed. Madonna hasn’t made a statement yet.
Thanks to Sam, StickySweety, Djs, MBoy and everyone at the MadonnaTribe Forum.
