Strike a Pose

Worth a link, you fuck up?

The last 20 minutes alone makes it well worth watching!

R1 It's on Netflix, prick. Look it up yourself.

I would watch this. Those were some heady days. Do you think Madonna had to allow them to use footage?

Only a half star rating on Netflix.

Madonna should redo the tour for shits and giggles with everyone back...It'd be a hoot with over half of those dancers obese now.

The asian guy was the hottest but you never saw him in that Truth or Dre movie.

My friend was a dancer on that tour, but was fired and cut from footage. There was an incident involving a lift and a tampon.

Such beautiful, talented men.

[quote] There was an incident involving a lift and a tampon.

His? The tampon that is.

Jose and Salim and follow-able on instagram. There may be a few more.

I'm watching it now. Shocked to see the ones with HIV are still living. Slam was diagnosed in late '87 and the meds were no way near as sophisticated as they are now. Carlton was diagnosed in 90 while onm tour.

Wait...did Luis just out himself and Madonna as being heroin addicts back in the day?

It aired on LOGO last week. Like everything else on LOGO, I assume it will be reaired again. Check your local listings.

R12 I thought the same thing.

Carlton's diagnosis story is confusing. At one point he says he was diagnosed in '85, but he also says he was diagnosed in Japan during the tour in '90.

Luis said he was with Madonna 'last month' shopping for magazines, then says it was when he was addicted to heroin many years ago.

R6 - I thought Salim (the Belgian who is half-Moroccan) was the hottest, followed closely by Gabriel (who sadly passed away from AIDS in 1995). Oliver (the heterosexual) was up there, too - or at least he was among the cutest.

I think the half-Asian guy (Kevin) was actually almost the *least* hot - though he was (as all the dancers were) fundamentally good-looking.

R15 - when Carlton refers to being diagnosed in Japan on a tour...I actually think he is referring to a different tour to Japan that he did earlier in his dance career - and *not* the Blond Ambition Tour. A few years before he landed the Madonna gig, he was a member of a touring dance company - and this company was on tour in Japan when he felt the need to go to the doctor, and was subsequently diagnosed.

I wonder if some shit went down between Oliver and the rest of the dancers back in the day - some shit that wasn't shown in "Truth or Dare".....because the vibe of most of the dancers toward Oliver during the reunion scene was odd, to say the least.

Maybe they were just resentful because Oliver wasn't gay like they were - and since 1990 was a more difficult time to be gay - perhaps there were automatic tensions stoked by having a token heterosexual on tour with all of these gay guys.

Didn't they all sue Madge at some point for non-payment?

R7 - was your friend black? People have noticed that there is an extra dancer in at least one scene of the "Vogue" video - a black guy, I believe - a dancer who seems to completely "disappear" by the time of the Blond Ambition tour and the other public appearances associated with it. I guess they couldn't cut him out of every scene.

R19 - not all of them, only three of them sued (Gabriel, Kevin, and Oliver). With Kevin and Oliver, it was more of a non-payment issue - but Gabriel was suing for different reasons. Gabriel desperately wanted the scene in which he is French-kissing Salim cut from the film - because he wasn't comfortable with being "out" to that degree. He was just interested in living his life in private, and didn't want to make a huge public splash about his sexuality. He claimed that Madonna and the filmmakers misrepresented their intentions to him - and told him that they wouldn't include any footage that he didn't want in the film. But when the French kiss was put in the film, and Gabriel protested the scene's inclusion - they did an about-face on him, and refused to remove the scene.

In the recounting of this situation, we get a good glimpse of Madonna's ruthless side. I don't think I could be so insensitive and stubborn as to refuse to remove intimate footage of someone when they are begging me to take it out - I would have eventually backed down (I hope). Gabriel told her that the inclusion of the scene was hurting him emotionally - and she still wouldn't back down.

so sad

So they all have HIV?

[quote]So they all have HIV?

Only Slam and Carlton are confirmed to be poz. Gabriel was but died from AIDS.

Oliver has Bell's Palsy and waits tables.

Luis is fat and Jose lives with his mom who resents him not becoming bigger and buying her a dream house she saw on a post card.

Kevin seems the most well adjusted.

Saw it at a screening several months ago; Carlton did a Q&A afterward. It was sad to see the dancer living with his mother at his age, and feeling her disappointment on top of his own.

Did they talk about that scary KIKIKIKI shrieking they did in the movie?

[quote]Did they talk about that scary KIKIKIKI shrieking they did in the movie?

What was that about? Was it an early 90s gay thing? I was 13 around this time.

Relocates?

Perhaps the same lack of long-term ambition and discipline that caused Jose's mother to not learn English in all of the 40-something years she's been in this country - afflicts her son.

Besides - the vast majority of dancers don't make "Upgrading Your Mom's House" money.

And not everyone can be a Vincent Patterson (who transitioned into a top choreographer after dancing lead in Michael Jackson's "Beat It" video) or a Debbie Allen. And even Debbie Allen married well - and branched out to other disciplines - to secure her livelihood.

Mama should have gotten her boy to be a baseball player if she wanted to live large off of her son's money.

[quote]This documentary relocates the male dancers

They forced them to move?

[quote]They didn't fair too well.

But how well did they carnival?

And Jose's apartment had all that tacky ass shit in it. Covered in plastic, no less.

I watched it and it was pretty sad. It showed that Madonna really does have amazing star power and none of these guys did.

Let's see if I understand this.

All these old queens, who were in Madonna's video, and on her tour, and were in a documentary released 25+ years ago, are now crying because they didn't do anything with their lives except rest on the laurels of the past?

The dancers are all in internment camps as we speak, R30!

R32 - I wonder if Jose and his mother still live on the Lower East Side? One would think that gentrification and corporatization has claimed all of Manhattan south of 125th St. by now.

R33: but it also showed - through the recollections of Gabriel's mother - that the same ruthless ambition that propelled Madonna to the top of the pop world - can make her insensitive, callous, and self-serving when dealing with people.

Someone like Oliver may not have Madonna's "star power" - but he seems to be an endearing human being who is at least trying to be sensitive to others. All of the guys - pretty much - had compelling, human stories to tell.

R15 Carlton was indeed diagnosed in '85, but he was having pains on tour with Madonna in Japan in '90. The tour sent him to the doctor where they told Carlton that'd have to tell Madonna. He told them not to tell her.

I saw that tour. I paid more attention to the dancers than to Madonna.

Madge was a total cunt when she laughed when that fat makeup girl got raped. Maybe somebody will laugh when ugly Rocco or hairy mustachioed Lourdes gets butt-raped.

The fat mom was really pissing me off. She could barely disguise her contempt for her son. She sucks.

So is it worth watching?

Oh Janbot @ R39. You are so transparent.

Salim Gauwloos was stunning.

He was the only good looking one. The rest of them seemed like trash.

He was trash wrapped in a pretty package.

r21 Who was the poor fat slob of a fag hag (Madonna's PA or hairdresser or something) in "Truth or Dare" who Madonna shamed by revealing that someone had spiked the poor slob's drink in a club, took her back to her hotel room and fucked her up the ass, and the woman had no memory of it. Madonna said (paraphrasing) to one of her staff members, "She woke up bleeding from her ass and can't remember how it happened."

Gabriel was gorgeous too.

R46 - you know, that scene kind-of went over my head when I watched TOD - "went over my head", meaning: I perhaps wasn't paying full attention to the dialogue and to exactly what was happening. That can happen in cinema-verite-like documentaries - since the dialogue isn't as "projected to the audience" and as carefully-delivered as in regular films. You have to watch those things multiple times to catch everything that unfolds.

Madonna is like the compliment to Bill Cosby - are we sure that she didn't watch a few of Cosby's rapes?

That scene could be used as evidence in a criminal prosecution or a civil suit.

R46. If only that "poor fat slob" had a kind friend like yourself to support her from that piece of "trash"

Another one here who only watched the dancers on that tour and every time she showed up on tv. I didn't expect them to become A-listers, but damn, at least some type of sucessful career.

How much money do backup dancers make for a concert tour?

r49 Water seeks it own level honey. That's all I'll say.

I remember Madonna sort of scolded when she left the room or something, not to talk about being on the tour etc.. bad things can happen

I suppose the Girlie Show dancers fared better.

Carrie-Ann got Dancing With The Stars, the black chick got her chance to shine in Showgirls when she took a spill on stage.

The male Girlie Show dancers were way hotter than the Blond Ambition ones.

Her female dancers seems more grateful than these queenies bitches from the documentary. Bitchy queenies like some DL posters on here.

.....

I watched this on Netflix. I got the impression she exploited these boys to an extent beyond what they were paid for, yes it was a unique opportunity but I guess you don't get to be Madonna level without being ruthless. It wasn't too long after this she moved onto her Mother Earth phase followed by the Guy Ritchie/English Lady period - these young men wouldn't have fitted too well with that.

The disappointed mother was awful, I felt really sorry for that man.

I thought they all aged fairly well considering what most of them had been through in the aftermath but I don't think most of them will ever really get over having been part of that world once.

R54: I don't know if those "Girlie Show" dancers are necessarily cuter than the Blond Ambition dancers - but the "Girlie Show" males do seem to have more studly bodies than several of the BA dancers. It looks like Madonna sponsored a Gold's Gym membership for her GS dancers.

Why does that dancer in the upper left look suspiciously like Cheryl "Salt" James of Salt-N-Pepa (during their "Whatta Man" phase)?

Carlton (front center?) was the only BA dancer who also did "Girlie Show". The shaved look flatters him more than that bob he was trying to sport during BA - trying to look like the dude from Damian Dame. Except the dude from Damian Dame mastered the look - while Carlton clearly struggled to maintain his. (Though it may be unfair to compare the two men - since the guy from Damian Dame owned the look so thoroughly that the hairstyle needs to be named after him.)

Why no mention in the movie of Donna and the other female backup singer/dancer?

Damn, Slam is so fucking hot. He is scorching in the Vogue video.

I realize that the filmmakers wanted to highlight (manufacture?) the "woe is me" aspects of the dancers' lives but I would have loved to hear about the making of or reaction to the Vogue video.

The dancers are featured so prominently in the video and surely more people have seen Vogue than Truth or Dare. The video is iconic, considered one of the all-time greatest and zero mention of it in the film. Bummer.

R60 Luis did mention that he and Jose were chosen to choreograph the Vogue video. And Jose was chosen because he introduced Madonna to the whole Vogue dance craze.

I have to give Madonna some credit. Not only did she not fire Carlton for being POZ, but she also brought him back for her next tour.

I've yet to see the documentary but I remember very well seeing Truth or Dare when it came out and I was 18. The film and its positive portrayal of gays is one of the biggest reasons I like Madonna. The world was a homophobic place at the time and Madonna showed us to the world as normal human beings, or let's say the biggest thing was the she was showing us in the first place. Was she taking advantage of gay men and showing us as something exotic? Maybe, to a point, but in the end she's more or less a staight woman who's lived parts of her life surrounded by gay guys and she gets us. Obviously Maddie is probably to a point incapable of being extremely empathetic and I personally don't expect her to constantly repeat how wonderful gay people are. I've understood she still speaks for gay rights like she's done in Russia and other homophobic countries. But no one's ever forced her to do so. We always get bitter posters claiming she was only using us and then dumped us but what do you expect? She's not a gay man herself, there's only so much one can do for other people.

BTW, I most certainly don't think Madonna is perfect by any means. Like I said she's probably sociopathic to a point. She's a shrewd businesswoman. It's fucked up if she didn't pay them but I'd like to hear her side of the story as well. Likewise with the kissing scene R21 mentioned. I actually believe it might've been just the R21 explained and they just needed to keep the kissing scene as a dramatic moment in the movie. Those guys probably signed contracts before the tour giving away all the rights to all filmed material so yes, it's probably more of a moral issue from Madonna's camp. Hopefully that kiss made some people see men kissing as being more normal, so maybe it has served its purpose.

Now, about the dancers. Well, dancers are like butterflies who have a short, and possibly a briliant, career. It's a shame if these guys never made it but the reality is guys like Paula Abdul, who rose to stardom from a dancer/choreographer background, are as rare as unicorns. I've never quite understood how background dancers are even expected to become anything more that they are. They are supporting the star. They get paid to do their jobs and that's it. It's show business.

Did I miss it or did they not tell us the outcomes of the lawsuits against Madonna?

R64 The lawsuits were finally settled out of court. But the $$ is probably sealed.

Kevin seems to have done quite well for himself since Blonde Ambition. He is an in-demand choreographer and is also an actor and model. He looks damn good for his age, too.

But since his story isn't tragic, we don't see too much of his current life in the film.

Hated all of them. Crushed majorly on the hot Italian looking one in her Vogue video. But in "Truth or Dare" is he a flamer or what? Madonna came off as thoughtless and quite self centered in that documentary. But so did the dancers to a certain degree! The whole "I'm dancing on Madonna's Tour and YOU'RE NOT!" Schtick got tired. I think they did the Queen Without a Country thing in "Paris is Burning", kids. Go back to your convenience store jobs.

Madonna back-up singers Niki Haris and Donna De Lory were awesome. They released an album together last year. I love their performance with Madonna at the VMA in 1989:

Agreed, R67. I was so disappointed when all those purses fell out of his mouth in the documentary. "Slam" is the one you're talking about.

A great interview with Niki Haris and Donna De Lory:

They asked them about the Strike a Pose documentary

Agreed R68. Madge and the girls showed them how it's done!

R62: Carlton says that for many years - including the years in which he worked with Madonna - he didn't tell anyone about his HIV status. This, for example - indicates that Madonna didn't even know that he was HIV+ when they worked together:

R59 - Salim was also scorching hot in the stage performance of "Vogue". Watch him hit that balance at about the 1:00 mark - hot damn.

It's much harder than it looks - unfortunately, it's not something you can just get up and do (I tried).

Salim “Slam” Gauwloos - the one you're all hot for - is Muslim.

Poor Slam had to hide his Barbies when Daddy came back into the picture.

R74 and your point is?

Kevin appears in the filmed version of Naked Boys Singing that came out 10 years ago.

One thing this thread has cleared up for me: when I was 11, I watched the Blond Ambition concert from Nice, France on HBO. (I remember counting down the days til it aired that summer.) I remembered fireworks at the end of the program. I remember even telling my mom about it the next morning: "and there were fireworks at the end!" What a little queen I was. My mom was like, "oh, wow." Then the next year when HBO reran it, it didn't have fireworks at the end. Then the laserdisc came out—still no fireworks. All this time I've wondered, "did I imagine the fireworks?" Because when I watched it the first time, we weren't HBO subscribers, and I had to watch it through a layer of "snow" on the video image (it wasn't as scrambled as other pay networks like Showtime, etc.).

But last night I did some searching on YouTube, and learned that there were fireworks on the Euro broadcast of the Barcelona show as well as the Nice show—they were just edited out in later re-airings and the home video release. Phew!

Can't believe all that was 27 years ago.

R20, I get the impression that Oliver replaced that dancer. If you watch the video, Oliver is only in it with his one scene dancing with Madonna.

At 02:32 you can see him dancing with Gabriel and Luis. He is also in the big number at the end and ends up directly behind Madonna. Oliver is not in the group scene at the end.

R79 - I see Oliver in the final group scene; at about 4:46 or 4:47 - Oliver is to the right of the formation, kneeling in a medium-colored suit (difficult to tell the exact color due to the video being in b&w), and a black hat.

I think Oliver isn't seen dancing in some of the hardcore Vogueing scenes because he had a different dancing background than the rest of the dancers. The other dancers were either Vogueing experts, or classically-trained dancers who could easily/quickly pick up the Vogueing aesthetic. Oliver was more strictly a hip-hop dancer, and did not have a classical (i.e. ballet) background. The "Vogue" video was shot pretty soon after the dancers were chosen and early in the Blond Ambition Tour rehearsal period - and Oliver probably required more time than the other dancers to get the Vogueing artform down.

From what Kevin has said over the years, *he* was the "late addition" to the group - and was the one who was hired last. He has even said that he was hired when another dancer was fired from the job. I guess the "Vogue" video was shot at some weird point during the transition - because both Kevin and the presumptive fired dancer are in the video.

Oliver is like the bookend to Luis in the group finale of the Vogue video - he is Luis's mirror image.

Oh, dear - so is Salim a member of ISIS now? The Islam-Demonization troll never misses an opportunity. Salim's *father* is/was Muslim - not him, necessarily. Perhaps when his father was in Salim's life, the father tried to force his Muslim beliefs/practices on young Salim - but it doesn't sound like the father was in Salim's life for very long. Overall, I don't think Salim grew up very religious, IIRC. Salim's mother is Catholic (or at least Christian).

You can clearly see that Salim is thoroughly socialized/assimilated in Western European culture - so whatever point the Islam-Demonization troll was trying to make is a dud.

In Salim's own words:

[Interview Question]: "Did you grow up Catholic?"

[Salim's Response]: "No, not really. My mom would say she was Catholic but we never went to church. It was just kind of like, 'Well, we walk by the church.' But definitely not. My father was Muslim. I’m half Moroccan. He was from Morocco but he passed away and was only in my life a couple years and then he disappeared. I’m a little bit of everything but I don’t go to church or practice."

If his father was Moroccan then his surname probably his mother's as it is certainly a Flemish name. He's beautiful today - amazing he was diagnosed all the way back in 87.

I wonder about Gabriel Trupin's background - he isn't here to give interviews like the rest of the dancers. What was in the documentary focused more on Gabriel's final years - with the lawsuit, and his emotional distress over Madonna's betrayal and his illness.

You'd never know that those dancers were plucked off the street by watching the Vogue video. David Fincher captured some amazing performances by all of them.

.....

I really liked it and it was sad but everyone make choices and she gave them a huge opportunity. They were so young though and because of that, I think Madonna does owes them something, but not sure what? I can't imagine what it must be like to be catapulted from obscurity to that level of notoriety at that age. Nobody is prepared for that. Felt bad for Luis and his big titted, bitch mom. I guess he needs her since he lives with her. He needs to get the fuck out of that toxic house.

The man with the nightmare mother is Jose, not Luis.

I wonder how much they made for each tour?

R86: "Plucked off the street?" You sound like these were young men with no actual dance training, or guys who hadn't danced at all before. All of them - with the possible exception of Jose and Luis - went through a rigorous audition process. And even Jose and Luis auditioned to *some* extent - where Madonna was pleased to see that they weren't just untrained ballroom dancers - but had the type of training where they could look doing doing the type of ambitious, versatile choreography that Madonna wanted to do.

There is a reason why the guys looked good in the "Vogue" video - and it's because they weren't just randomly plucked off the street. Hundreds of dancers auditioned for this gig - these 7 were carefully chosen.

"[Jose Gutierez] felt compelled to do whatever it took to stay in [Madonna's] good graces. Gutierez says his devotion was so deep that when Michael Jackson asked him to work on his Dangerous world tour and Madonna told him to turn it down, he obeyed. 'Even though I love this man, I am going to turn this down to show loyalty to [Madonna],' Gutierez remembers thinking. 'I wish I would have [gone] with him.'”

R84 and shocking that Salim was infected with HIV from his first sexual encounter.

Fascinating how some posters love drool over these dancers in the Vogue video, but now that the guys have hit middle age they would appear to be disposable. We're all headed in that direction . Before you know it you'll be hitting 50.

Carlton and Salim are still very attractive. IMHO.

Yeah, it sounds like Luis says he and Madonna shared a herion habit but after rewinding that scene a couple times it seems he could be talking about himself and Jose. He said Madonna told "them" to get help and began backing away from them. Notice how the filmmakers bookended that scene with the scenes of Jose crying over his failures sitting next to his mom, and how he mentions his mom has no idea what he was really into. I believe Jose and Luis were smackheads together, but maybe Jose didn't want to reveal that too directly in the film to spare his mom being even more ashamed of him than she already is.

R96 That mother was awful

What's sad about the doc is that at the end, when they all re-unite, there's an elephant in the room—actually not in the room—and it's Madonna herself, who isn't there. There's no doubt she was asked to participate and she declined.

So. Can someone start a thread now, on what happened to the dancers that were going to be on Michael Jackson’s last tour? All the bawling and tears they showed about getting chosen from auditions. There has to be some waiting to be asked about their follow up stories. And damn, that young woman on electric guitar had some great musical chops. She must be playing somewhere, she was gifted.

What about Christopher Ciccone?

R100 Think I saw mentioned in another thread he had just moved home to Detroit...but could have been shade

God, I need a Prozac after watching this. I don't know what was sadder - Slam getting HIV from his first sexual encounter, Jose living with his awful mother and a sofa wrapped in plastic, Carlton taking all those pills or Oliver working as a waiter. Makes my ass rape look like Christmas morning.

Madonna. What a guy.

Who is Madonna's most successful former backup dancer?

Carrie-Ann Inaba?

The actress who did Kingsman and Star Trek and ended up with more of an acting career than Vadge?

I wonder if there wasn't a lawsuit, if she would've asked back the dancers for The Girlie Show Tour.

I watched this last night and it was sad and depressing. Not one of them looked to be doing well financially. One lived with his mom in a cramped apartment, one lived in a studio apartment with the bed right next to the kitchen, and the rest lived in the kind of apartments one would live in when they're in their 20's, not almost 50. I felt sorry for them. Even worse, some of them still insist on trying to make a living dancing, whether teaching or dancing themselves. Did nobody ever teach them that a dancer's career is usually over by 30 and you need to have something else to fall back on? Very few people become rich and successful choreographers. Why not go back to school and learn a trade or something? That would be awful to be struggling financially at that age.

Watching now. Jesus this is depressing.

I’m 30, so I am very appreciative of the fact that we are living in an age where being gay isn’t as toxic as it was before (thank you elder gays). But after watching this, I can’t help but feel like Madonna fetishized us more than anything.

In their prime they wouldn't have given most DLers the time of day.