Actors - Like a Virgin

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	Actors - Like a Virgin

"Like a Virgin" is the first single from American singer Madonna which was taken from her 1984 album Like A Virgin. It also appears on her compilation album The Immaculate Collection.

"Like a Virgin" (the song) was Madonna's biggest hit until "Vogue", and her biggest hit of the 1980s. It was written by Billy Steinberg and Tom Kelly, and remained the number-one hit single on the Billboard pop singles charts (U.S.) for six consecutive weeks.

Madonna has reinvented the song by singing it with different arrangements on her Blond Ambition tour and The Girlie Show. Madonna wears a wedding gown in the music video, which was directed by Mary Lambert.

"Like a Virgin" was honored by Rolling Stone and MTV in 2000 as the fourth song on their list of the "100 Greatest Pop Songs".

Production

"Like a Virgin" was written by Billy Steinberg and Tom Kelly, and was produced by Nile Rodgers. Other credits on the song are as follows:

Bass by Bernard Edwards.
Guitar by Nile Rodgers.
Drums by Tony Thompson.
Assorted synthesizers and bass synthesizer by Rob Sabino.

The music video, directed by Mary Lambert, was shot in Venice, Italy and partly in New York City. It shows Madonna dancing on a gondola and running around in a wedding dress. It premiered on MTV on July 12, 1984 and became an instant hit.

Two other live-performance videos also exist, one from the Virgin Tour (directed by Danny Kleinmann, released in 1985) and one from the Blond Ambition Tour (directed by Alek Keshishian, and released in 1991).

Reception

The title and lyrics were enough to raise eyebrows in 1984. Madonna's performance at the 1984 MTV Video Music awards is considered by many to be her true "arrival". Wearing the white wedding dress from her music video (Boy-Toy belt buckle and all), Madonna rolled around onstage and simulated masturbation with the veil, making it one of the most famous performances of her career.

In 1990, Madonna again attracted attention for performing the song. Dressed in a gold bustier with the iconic cone-bra, Madonna again simulated masturbation, this time on a crimson bed, while singing a Middle Eastern-influenced version of the song. The performance was so risque that police in Toronto, Canada, threatened to arrest her and charge her with indecency. Madonna, of course, was unyielding, stating that she would much rather cancel the show than change it. The show went on unaltered, and the police backed off.

Tributes and cover versions

The song was the subject of a famous exegesis in the opening scene of Quentin Tarantino's film, Reservoir Dogs
. It was also the subject of a parody by "Weird Al" Yankovic, "Like A Surgeon", and was performed by Jim Broadbent in the film Moulin Rouge!
(2001) as a comic piece sung in the third person singular ("She made it through the wilderness..."). A rare version of the song was a duet recorded by Marilyn Manson and Trent Reznor (the Nine Inch Nails frontman).

Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera paid a tribute to Madonna's performance at the MTV Video Awards show nineteen years later at the same award show, finishing the performance with a kiss. The kiss generated months of discussion in celebrity magazines.

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