Director: Roger Watkins Cast: Samantha Fox, Robin Byrd, Christine DeShaffer, Kandi Barbour, Vanessa Del Rio, Robert Kerman, Ron Jeremy Year: 1979 Directed by the late Roger Watkins (credited as Richard Mahler) in 1979, The Pink Ladies opens with a scene where Lori (Samantha Fox), Kay (Kandi Barbour), Jane (Robin Byrd) and Leslie (Christine De Shaffer) are at the gym playing racquetball, watched by a voyeuristic man (Rob Hudd) who imagines three of them servicing him. It’s a playful introduction, clearly done with a very intentional sense of humor. From here, the film lets us get to know these four housewives a little better and it soon becomes obvious that Leslie is going to be the butt of most of the film’s jokes. The others poke playful fun at her, and she might not be the sharpest knife in the drawer. It never feels mean-spirited, however, and the film remains genuinely fun throughout its duration. The film deals mainly in fantasies, we know that from the opening scene. From there, we meet a man named Bert (Robert Bolla) who, after he finishes watching baseball and eating pizza, heads outside to masturbate while he watches his niece (Marica Minor) get it on with her boyfriend. That leads into a scene where Jane gives enthusiastic blowjobs to four guys (one of whom is Ron Jeremy, who does his trademark ‘I’m gonna blow myself’ move in this scene). After that, Kay gets all aroused by reading a sexy book, which leads to her imaging herself involved in a lesbian tryst with Marlene Willoughby and Barbara Daniels. After that we get a quick bondage fantasy and that leads into a scene where four men sitting on a bench at a train station - Michael Gaunt, Jesse Adams, Robert Kerman and Alan Adrian – spot a beautiful woman (Vanessa Del Rio) and each imagine themselves getting involved with her. The film’s big finish is an orgy at a gym where our four housewives get involved with a few of the male stars introduced earlier in the film – with all of the participants wearing colored body paint! If this isn’t Watkins’ most memorable adult picture (both Corruption and Her Name Was Lisa show far more creativity both in narrative and direction style), The Pink Ladies is, if nothing else, a whole lot of XXX fun. The whole thing is put together very playfully, devoid of the nihilism inherent in some of the director’s darker films which makes it easy to watch and enjoy. The performances are quite good all around, and all of the participants appear to be enjoying themselves. Samantha Fox could have used more screen time but is quite good here, and the lovely Kandi Barbour looks as good here as she ever has. De Shaffer plays the stereotypical airhead character quite well and Robin Byrd is nothing if not enthusiastic. Maybe not so surprisingly, Ms. Del Rio owns the latter half of the film, but the bondage scene is also quite well done, involving both genuine humor and legitimate kink. The film is well-shot and it features solid production values for an NYC-lensed adult film of the era. It’s reasonably glossy, makes good use of varied and interesting locations and the use of music in the picture is inventive and quirky enough to work.

The Re-Invention World Tour (also billed as Re-Invention World Tour 2004) was the sixth concert tour by American singer-songwriter Madonna, in support of her ninth studio album American Life. The tour began on May 24 in Inglewood and ended on September 14 of the same year in Lisbon. Additionally, it marked Madonna's first concerts in Portugal and Ireland. Madonna was inspired to create the tour after taking part in an art installation called X-STaTIC PRo=CeSS, directed by photographer Steven Klein. She incorporated the images from the installation in the tour, whose name was in reality a dig at Madonna's critics. A number of songs were rehearsed for the tour, with twenty-one of them making the final setlist. The tour was divided into five segments: French Baroque–Marie Antoinette Revival, Military–Army, Circus–Cabaret, Acoustic and Scottish-Tribal. The costumes were developed by designer Arianne Phillips based on the concept of re-invention. The opening segment displayed performances with dance in general. Military segment displayed performances with the theme of warfare. Circus displayed light-hearted performances while the Acoustic segment performances were melancholy. The final Scottish segment had Madonna and her performers display energetic dance routines. The tour garnered positive reception from contemporary critics. However, fellow singer Elton John accused Madonna of lip-synching during the tour. Madonna's representatives denied the allegations and John later apologized. Re-Invention Tour was a commercial success with total sell-outs and multiple extra dates being added. It became the highest-grossing concert tour of 2004, earning over $125 million from 56 shows, and an audience of over 900,000. The tour was awarded with the Top Tour trophy at the 2004 Billboard Touring Awards. Madonna released a documentary titled I'm Going to Tell You a Secret, which chronicled the tour and contained performances from the last show in Lisbon. Background Madonna and her dancers opening the concert with "Vogue" The Re-Invention World Tour was Madonna's sixth concert tour in support of her ninth studio album American Life. In 2003, Madonna collaborated with photographer Steven Klein for an art installation project called X-STaTIC Pro=CeSS. The installation portrayed Madonna in different incarnations of her spiritual practices – from yogi, prophet, queen to freak and pole dancer. The publication was a worldwide success, leading to a number of exhibitions in New York, London, Paris, Düsseldorf, Berlin and Florence.[2] After the exhibition was over, Madonna was inspired by the images from the exhibitions and decided to incorporate them into her then unplanned tour and asked Klein to help her with the task. The poster released for the tour used one of the images from the installation project. It featured Madonna in a seventeenth century style dress, crawling on all fours towards the camera.[2] Klein later commented that, "The thing is, I always saw Madonna as a performance artist. And I think what I wanted to portray was the process about how a performer arrives at their work. And the thing is, what she had talked about as well, is that before a concert, what she finds very interesting is the rehearsals and the straining and maybe she would like to injure. [...] And she said that the process of making the concert became more intriguing than the final result."[3] The main intention of the tour was to transform Madonna's old hits musically and display her capacity for transformation and self-reflection.[4] The tour was initially known as the Whore of Babylon World Tour,[5] although Madonna later denied using this name.[6] The idea was to portray Madonna as the Whore of Babylon, an evil figure from the Book of Revelation. However it was later changed to the Re-Invention World Tour, a self-confident dig at all the critics and people who have expressed their views about Madonna re-inventing her image over the years.[7] Air-conditioning was turned off during the tour on Madonna's request as she claimed it dried up her throat during singing.