After rocking Rio, here’s what Madonna should do next… but won’t

When you’re the world’s most famous singer and renowned for reinventing yourself, how do you follow a record-breaking performance on Copacabana beach in front of a crowd of millions? Paul Clements has an idea – but Her Madgesty is not going to like it

Madonna’s 81-date Celebration tour has been a critical and commercial success (Getty for MTV/ViacomCBS)

Tonight, Madonna plays the biggest concert of her life, the highlight of a career festooned with superlatives. A record-breaking two million people are expected on Rio’s famous seafront to watch the best-selling female artist of all time wind up her greatest hits world tour with an open-air spectacular to end all others.

But, what’s that? Will the undisputed Queen of Pop use this occasion to go out on a high, and bring down the curtain on her astonishing life in music? Fat chance – but maybe she should.

Certainly, there’s a sense of an ending in the air. Her 81-date “Celebration” tour, an enormous critical and commercial success, of course, has been beset by setbacks professional and personal. The opening leg had to be postponed while the star recovered from being put into a two-day coma to clear the bacterial infection that nearly killed her. Can’t wait for the inevitable song about that on the next album.

Lately, it seems like headlines are more easily generated by Madonna the patient than Madonna the performer. Before that near-fatal infection, she underwent hip surgery for an injury sustained on her previous tour. She has torn ligaments, twisted cartilage, and shared images on Instagram of various body parts covered in bruises. Then there was the Armani cape-related fall on stage at the 2015 Brit Awards that gave her whiplash. She has cracked countless ribs and broken multiple bones falling off horses. Yet, one suspects, if she were ever to ease up, the shock to her system would surely kill her more quickly than any ward-acquired nasty.

But if a near-death experience doesn’t give you pause about what you’re doing with your life, perhaps the prospect of being sued by ungrateful superfans might. During this latest tour, a couple of concert-goers filed a lawsuit, miffed at her “total disrespect” for making them “wait hours for her performance in a hot, uncomfortable arena”. It’s a low-key niggle that would convince lesser artists to throw in the towel – who needs the hassle when you can just retire and count your millions?

You can see why Madonna keeps buggering on. Ahead of tonight’s beach party, hundreds of devotees have taken up residence outside the Copacabana Palace, clogging up the esplanade in front of Rio’s smartest beachfront address, commandeered for her residency, where for days they have been singing her songs as they keep a round-the-clock vigil. Say what you will about Madonna – here goes: someone needs to delete Instagram from her phone, or change her password – but she has never failed to inspire adoration.

And this gig is a seriously hot ticket. The South American winter is approaching but Rio is baking in 30C heat. Copacabana would be an amazing moment for Her Madgesty to take a bow. But she doesn’t take hints or advice. As any fan knows, Madonna is not only fiercely ambitious and driven to the point of madness keeping up with the younglings hungry for her pop crown, she tends to meet what other people think with an extended middle finger.

Confession time: I didn’t see this latest tour. I didn’t fancy forking out the best part of £500 on a seat in a draughty arena – been there, done that, bought the souvenir T-shirt that shrank on a first wash – and, judging from the video clips I’ve seen online, for all the rave reviews, I’m glad I saved the money.

Pick a clip at random and watch it with the sound down: once razor-sharp dance routines are now mostly reduced to a series of perfunctory gestures, the very definition of going through the motions.

There’s one particular video that haunts me – and it went viral at the time – of a sunglasses-wearing Madge clinging to a support bar while grinding and gyrating with all the geriatric grace of Bren’s mother in Dinnerladies. You can forgive a 65-year-old not flinging herself about the stage, but vogueing? At times, she appears to struggle with walking.

This might be a good moment for Madonna to “do a Dietrich” and, like her longtime muse, become a recluse. That way, she could pop back for the occasional supper-club appearance, perching on a piano stool to belt out the hits while ageing eligible bachelors in the audience throw single roses at her feet. Now that really would be a radical reinvention.

Can’t see it happening, though. So, don’t cry for her, Copacabana – the truth is Madonna will do whatever the hell she likes.