New York’s Museum of Modern Art held a special screening of Madonna: Truth or Dare this Wednesday to celebrate the documentary’s 25th anniversary, and little did they know that the Material Girl herself would be paying a visit.
Madonna: Truth or Dare, or what was then released as In Bed with Madonna,first hit theaters in 1991. The film presented a behind-the-scenes look at the star’s rise during her 1990 “Blonde Ambition” tour, where concerts were held to promote her hit albums I’m Breathless and Like a Prayer. Notably, the documentary also revealed intimate details about her private life, diving into the details that would inform her artistic vision.
In a blog post for MoMA, Izzy Lee, an assistant for the museum’s department of film, notes that the film “features her subverting gender norms, knowingly embodying Freud’s Madonna–whore complex.” She added: “The concept outlined two mutually exclusive ways to construct a sexual identity, and has been personified by two of Madonna’s biggest influences: the ever feminine Marilyn Monroe and the gender-subversive Marlene Dietrich.