Madonna sure can gyrate // Singer gives new meaning to `backfield in motion'

After Madonna told the crowd she was going to dance herderriere off for us, or words to that effect, she launched into abrand-new song called "Causing a Commotion." She proceeded to showSoldier Field a few moves that would gain Walter Payton some yardage,while putting a whole new twist on the term "backfield in motion."The girl really knows how to cause a commotion.

Those who have been waiting for Madonna to fade quickly, if notquietly, will have to keep on waiting. On only her second concerttour, she has made the leap from 10,000-seat arenas to footballstadiums such as Soldier Field, which was pretty well packed Fridaynight.

The "Who's That Girl" tour is serving as the best possibleadvance promotion for her new "Who's That Girl" movie (openingFriday, at a theater near everyone in the known universe). Precedingthe film are songs from the inevitable soundtrack album, which shouldfill the pop airwaves for the forseeable future.

Instead of the quick fade, Madonna has returned stronger thanever. Although most performers sacrifice a lot of intimacy andcontrol when they make the leap to oversized outdoor venues, Madonnaseemed even more confident, appealing and entertaining at SoldierField than she did last time through at the Pavilion.

She designed a show that was big enough to work in such a bigvenue. More so than before, she was very much the actress, throwingherself convincingly into a series of roles. She played to thecameras as much as to the crowd, as video screens were carryingcloseups to the outer reaches of the stadium.

The pace was fast and varied, the choreography inventive, thedirection tight. It was easier to feel more intimately involved withwhat was happening onstage than it generally is in much smallerhalls.

Where so many expensive shows treat extravagance as an end initself, Madonna made sure that the focus remained on the songsthemselves. For the show-opening "Open Your Heart," she was theB-girl with a heart of gold. For all of Madonna's much-vauntedsensuality, what made the song work was her ability to convey pureromance. In her black bustier, she made sex seem the mostirresistibly innocent of pleasures.

She shifted toward prom-dress demurity with "True Blue," wherethe teenage romance led directly into the unwed pregnancy of "PapaDon't Preach." It was apparent throughout that plenty of thought andcare had gone into the staging, that the sense of style which hadmade Madonna so effective on video was very much a part of herconcert performance as well.

Accused of being simply a video creation, Madonna has also beenaccused of not being able to sing. Although there are plenty ofsingers that have a greater vocal range, Madonna has an instinctivesense of how to sing a song. On "Live to Tell," the evening's loneballad, she showed she could sell a lyric more convincingly than alot of singers with ten times the voice.

On occasion, the production overwhelmed the music, but onlywhen the music was not strong to begin with. With its gangstermotif, "White Heat" was one of the more ambitiously staged numbers ofthe evening, which showed it takes more than choreographic glitz toprop up mediocre material. "Where's the Party" is a throwaway tunecompared with Madonna's best, although it was refreshing to see herpoke some fun at her media image.

When she turned her medley of "Dress You Up," "Material Girl"and "Like a Virgin" into a slapstick sendup of glamor, Madonna showedshe has the sense not to take this stuff too seriously.

Those who would make her into a modern-day Marilyn Monroe aremissing the essence of her populist appeal. Instead of theout-of-reach, other-worldly brand of glamor that was long Hollywood'sstock in trade, Madonna's is accessible to everybody. She makes noclaim to being drop-dead gorgeous; under that platinum-blondfrosting, she always lets her roots show. Where Marilyn Monroe waseverybody's victim, Madonna is nobody's fool.