In news that has sent shockwaves around the entertainment industry, Madonna has been forced to postpone her upcoming tour after being hospitalised with a bacterial infection so severe that her family feared they would “lose her”.
The Queen of Pop, 64, was reportedly found unconscious in New York on Saturday, before being taken to hospital where she spent several days in intensive care.
The mother-of-six is expected to make a full recovery, but has been forced to “pause” her upcoming 40th anniversary tour, her manager said.
The ambitious 84-date global Celebration tour had been scheduled to kick off in Vancouver on July 15, and included four sell-out nights at London’s O2 Arena in October.
A relative has said: “For the past couple of days, no one really knew which direction this was going to turn, and her family was preparing for the worst.
They added that the health scare has served as a wake-up call for the singer, saying Madonna “believes that she is invincible” and “has been wearing herself thin over the past couple of months”.
“That is why it was kept a secret since Saturday. Everyone believed that we may lose her and that has been the reality of the situation.”
Madonna was joined at her bedside by eldest child Lourdes, 26, and sources have said that the hospitalisation has brought them closer together.
With six children and seven siblings, the pop icon is certainly not short of family members to support her – but who is in her extensive clan?
Josh Popper
Who: Madonna’s 29-year-old boyfriend
Madonna’s boyfriend Josh Popper shared a cryptic post on his Instagram page the day the news of her health scare broke. The 29-year-old boxing coach posted several boxing photos on his Instagram and shared an emotional message alongside them. “Give yourself permission to live a big life. Step into who you were meant to be. Stop playing small. You are meant for greater t,” it said. "Thank you to my coach @fftstrong, my family, and the Bredwinners team for being by my side."
The pair confirmed they were dating in March 2023, making it Instagram official with a picture of them masked and dressed in all black, kissing with a caption reading “Killers who are partying.”
Popper is the owner of the boxing gym Bredwinners in Manhattan. A biography on the Bredwinner’s website describes Popper as a “lifelong athlete and a full-time coach.”
According to reports, the pair first met when the 29-year-old was training Madonna’s 17-year-old son David at his gym.
Lourdes Leon
Who: Madonna’s 26-year-old daughter
Madonna’s eldest child, 26-year-old Lourdes remained by her mother’s side throughout her hospitalisation, according to Page Six. Madonna dated Lourdes’ father, actor and fitness trainer Carlos Leon, from 1994 and 1997, and the pair reportedly remain close. In a 2021 interview with Interview Magazine, Lourdes, whose stage name is Lola, alleged that her mother controlled most of her life.
"We don’t get any handouts in my family," she began. "Obviously, I grew up with extreme privilege. There’s no denying that. But I think my mom saw all these other kids of famous people, and she was like, ‘My kids are not going to be like this.’" She continued: "Also, I feel like if your parents pay for things, then it gives them leverage over you. My mom is such a control freak, and she has controlled me my whole life. I needed to be completely independent from her as soon as I graduated high school."
“My mom is very insistent on making me think about what I want to be known for beyond my looks. That’s not what I want people to remember me by. It’s not real.”
Naturally, the New York-based model and singer is also incredibly protective of her mother, often defending her against online trolls. "It’s really funny to me," she continued to Interview Magazine. "People are always really taken aback when I say that, because it’s like, ‘Bitch, don’t talk about my mom if you don’t want me to talk about your mom. You want to call my mom a whore? Okay, your mom is a whore.’ If you feel like you have the right to comment on my mother, then I’m going to do the same to you."
Talking to the New York Post, a Madonna source described Lourdes as “spiky” and “tough”. “Lourdes has an enormous sense of self. Her attitude is defiant, all day, every day.”
Madonna gushed over her eldest child to British Vogue in 2019, saying: “I’m green with envy because she’s incredible at everything she does … she’s way better than me in the talent department.”
Rocco Ritchie
Who: Madonna’s 22-year-old son
After the news broke of her health scare, Madonna’s eldest son, Rocco Ritchie, shared several photos and videos of his motorcycle trip in Transylvania, Romania. Posted on June 26, two days after Madonna’s hospitalisation, the 22-year-old did not mention his mother’s health, simply saying he’d had a “crazy trip” in a “crazy place” and was looking forward to more adventures.
The son of Madonna and Guy Ritchie, Rocco is a budding artist who paints under the pseudonym Rhed, and sharing his work via Instagram under the pseudonym Maison Rhed.
"She’s a good mother … She’s very strict but in a good way," Rocco told Ellen DeGeneres of his mother in 2012.
As a young teenager, Rocco often danced with his mother on stage, but Madge told Entertainment Weekly in 2015 that her 14-year-old son was no longer “interested in performing” with her. A few months later, in December 2015, news of Madonna and Guy Ritchie’s bitter custody battle emerged.
Rocco stopped travelling with his mum on tour, and decided to move into his father’s country estate in Devon. Despite a judge in December 2015 ordering the Hollywood director to send Rocco back to his mother in New York, the child remained with his father. A few months later, Madonna and Guy settled the custody battle privately, and Rocco continued to split his time between his parents.
It seems that the pair have patched things up in recent years, with Rocco’s artwork being exhibited in a salon owned by his mother’s hair stylist Andy LeCompte.
"We have been on many trips together around the world, but the greatest journey I have taken with you is the one inside my ♥ï¸," Madonna wrote for her son’s 21st birthday. "Love you to the moon and back. Forever and always."
David Banda
Who: Madonna’s 17-year-old son
After founding charity Raising Malawi in 2006, Madonna visited the country in October of that year. While there, she Guy Ritchie, her partner at the time, decided to adopt one-year-old David from Home of Hope, an orphanage in the capital city of Lilongwe.
The couple faced a legal battle, because Malawian residency is a prerequisite to adoption, but it was finally approved on May 28, 2008.
In a 2019 interview with British Vogue, Madonna said she had a special connection with David. "He’s the one I have the most in common with," she said. "I feel like he gets me; he has more of my DNA than any of my children so far." As he has grown up, David has often been included in Madonna’s performances, for example joining her on stage at her New York City Pride variety show in June 2022, and the pair recently posted a TikTok together showing off their dance moves.
"I cannot believe you have grown into this young man! This artist. This athlete. This articulate and charismatic human," she wrote on David’s 16th birthday. "Who knew when I met you at Home of Hope Orphanage in Malawi, drinking coke out of a baby bottle and wearing no diaper, that you would become this force of nature? Happy sweet sixteen! â¤ï¸ð§¡ððððð¤ð¤ I’m so proud of you!"
Chifundo “Mercy” James
Who: Madonna’s 17-year-old daughter
A year after settling her divorce with Guy Ritchie, Madonna applied to adopt Mercy as a single mother from an orphanage in Blantyre, Malawi. Her adoption application was initially rejected by the High Court, but she was later granted approval to adopt Mercy on June 12, 2009.
Last year, Mercy made a rare appearance in public for her 16th birthday party, which Madonna shared on her Instagram.
The superstar revealed that she and Mercy, along with her boyfriend at the time Ahlamalik Williams and son David, spent their day at theme park Six Flags.
Stella and Estere Ciccone
Who: Madonna’s 10-year-old twin daughters
Madonna also adopted her two youngest children, 10-year-old twins Stella and Estere, from Malawi in 2017.
Little is known about the twins’ lives, but Madonna did share a picture of her youngest children graduating from elementary school last week. Taking to her Instagram story to share a photo of the twins in blue caps and gowns, she captioned the picture “2 Kweens!!!! Happy Graduation!”.
“Growing up with a mother like me is a challenge,” Madonna told Vanity Fair in January. “It has been the most difficult, the hardest battle.”
“Because, whoever you are, having children and raising them is a work of art,” she explained. “And no one gives you a manual. You have to learn from mistakes. It is a profession that requires a lot of time. And it is exhausting because there is never rest.”
Madonna’s seven siblings
Despite Madonna’s extreme fame, her seven siblings, and their 92-year-old father, have managed to stay largely out of the spotlight.
Sisters Paula, Melanie and Jennifer and brothers Martin, Christopher and Mario are believed to have rallied round Madonna and visited her while she was in the ICU.
Her health scare will come as a particular blow to her family after the death of their brother Anthony from throat cancer and respiratory failure, aged 66, in February. He had a troubled life, battling alcoholism and falling into homelessness.
After his death, Madonna paid tribute to her brother on Instagram, writing: "Thank you for blowing my mind as a young girl and introducing me to Charlie Parker, Miles David, Buddhism, Taoism, Charles Bukowski, Richard Brautigan, Jack Kerouac, expansive thinking, outside the box. You planted many important seeds."
The first five Ciccone siblings grew up in Detroit to Catholic parents, an Italian-American father and French-Canadian mother Madonna, whom the Queen of Pop was named after. When Madonna was just five, her mother died of breast cancer, and her father married the family’s housekeeper three years later. They had two children, Jennifer and Mario.
Martin Ciccone
Madonna’s oldest brother Martin, 75, has had a troubled past, battling alcoholism, a stint in jail and rehab.
In 1994, he followed in his sister’s footsteps and released a debut rap album under the name MC Ciccone, which included a few digs at Madonna.
Paula Ciccone
Paula Ciccone, Madonna’s 63-year-old sister, is head winemaker at the family’s vineyard in Michigan.
The 13-acre plot was set up by their father and his second wife Joan in 1995, the award-winning vineyard has become a popular destination for wine tasting. In 2004, when the business was struggling, Madonna reportedly donated £754,000 to help save it.
Melanie Ciccone
Melanie Ciccone, also 63, is reportedly Madonna’s closest sibling and apparently held her sister’s hand while she gave birth to her first child Lourdes.
“No one knows better than her what it's like to survive our toxic and broken family from Michigan,” the singer once said of Melanie.
Christopher Ciccone
Christopher Chiccone, 62, began his career as Madonna’s stylist and assistant. However, her younger brother went on to write a tell-all book about her, Life With My Sister Madonna, published in 2008.
In it, he included digs such as labelling his sister a “middle-class girl who propagates the story that she landed in Times Square with just a pair of ballet shoes and $35 to her name,” saying that it is“pure mythology and the further she progresses, the more mythological her life story becomes”.
In an interview with the Evening Standard in 2012, he said: “(We are) on a perfectly personable level right now. As far as I’m concerned, we’re good. We are in contact with each other, although I haven’t seen her for a long time. We’re back to being a brother and sister. I don’t work for her, and it’s better this way.”
Additionally he stated his pride for his sister: “I couldn’t be more proud of her. She is a force to be reckoned with. Does she have Barbra Streisand’s voice? No. Can she dance like Martha Graham? Probably not. But the combination of her abilities has made her great, and left a huge legacy for her, and through her, for me. So yeah, God bless her.”
Jennifer Ciccone
Madonna’s 64-year-old sister Jennifer also works on the family vineyard alongside Paula.
She has been pictured at Madonna concerts over the years.
Mario Ciccone
Madonna’s 53-year-old half brother also Mario Ciccone also works on the family vineyard.
The youngest of the Ciccone siblings, he previously worked at Madonna’s record company, Maverick records.
