Madonna is shedding new light on why her long-awaited biopic never made it to the big screen.
The Queen of Pop recently revealed that creative and financial disagreements ultimately derailed the project, which had been in development for years and was set to star Julia Garner as the music icon.
“I was supposed to make a movie about my life,” Madonna told Interview Magazine.
“I worked on my script for two years and spent two years at Universal Studios with the line producers doing budgeting and casting.”
The film was first announced in 2020, with Diablo Cody and Erin Cressida Wilson attached to help develop the screenplay. Over time, Madonna assumed full control of the writing process, determined to tell her story on her own terms.
© Getty ImagesAccording to the singer, the biggest obstacle became the scope of the project itself.
“We had a falling out, me and Universal, regarding budget because I needed [more money put into it]. I’ve had an extraordinary life. I’ve had a huge life, so I needed a big budget. You know what I mean? It’s not going to be a [smaller, independent film],” she explained.
Madonna said she even proposed alternative solutions to keep costs down, including moving production overseas.
© SOPA Images/LightRocket via Gett“Maybe they just didn’t believe in me. One of their first reactions was, ‘We don’t believe you’d stay in Serbia more than four days.’ And I said, ‘Did you read the script?’ My whole life has been survival. I’m not going there for a holiday,” she recalled.
After the movie stalled, Madonna explored a different path. Netflix expressed interest in turning the story into a limited series, but that effort brought a new set of complications.
“I was in limbo when that fell apart, and then Netflix reached out to make a series,” she said.
© New York Daily News Archive“That was a whole other long process, because I couldn’t use the script I had with Universal unless I bought it from them for an extortionist’s price, even though I wrote it.”
The singer spent nearly a year trying to reimagine the project for television, but eventually concluded that the format wasn’t the right fit.
“That’s just the way it goes… You have to meet a lot of writers and find the right showrunner, and I couldn’t find one,” she explained.
© Getty“This went on for another eight or nine months. I was like, ‘Good thing I have another job because I need to work, I need to create. I need to do what I was put on this earth to do.’”
For now, Madonna appears to have put the biopic behind her and shifted her attention back to music.
The superstar is preparing to release her 15th studio album, Confessions II, on July 3. The project serves as a spiritual follow-up to her 2005 dance-pop hit record Confessions on a Dance Floor and marks her first album since 2019’s Madame X.
© Kevin MazurThe new release reunites Madonna with longtime collaborator Stuart Price and has already been accompanied by a splashy promotional campaign.
In recent weeks, she surprised fans with an impromptu performance in New York City’s Times Square.
She unveiled a star-studded short film featuring Sabrina Carpenter, Benedict Cumberbatch, Kate Moss, Julia Garner, Shygirl, Richard E. Grant, Honey Dijon, and more.
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