Madonna, Like a Virgin and marriage to Sean Penn

  

        Madonna signed a singles deal with Sire Records, a label belonging to Warner Bros. Records. Her debut single, "Everybody", was released on April 24, 1982, and became a dance hit. Her debut album, Madonna, was primarily produced by Reggie Lucas. At the same time, she became involved with artist Jean-Michel Basquiat and lived with him for a time in his loft. Soon after, she left the artist because of his drug use and late hours, moving in with musician John "Jellybean" Benitez to continue developing the album. After its release, it peaked at number eight on the Billboard 200, and produced the top-ten singles, "Borderline" and "Lucky Star".
Slowly, Madonna's look and manner of dress, her performances and music videos, became influential among young girls and women. Mainly created by stylist and jewellery designer Maripol, Madonna's style of dress – defined by lace tops, skirts over capri pants, fishnet stockings, jewelry bearing the Christian cross, multiple bracelets, and bleached hair – became a female fashion trend of the 1980s. Madonna eventually achieved global recognition after the release of her sophomore album, Like a Virgin (1984). It topped the charts in several countries and became her first number-one album on the Billboard 200. The title track "Like a Virgin" reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 chart for six consecutive weeks. Madonna performed the song at the first MTV Video Music Awards, where she appeared on stage atop a giant wedding cake dressed in a wedding dress, adorned with the infamous "Boy Toy" belt buckle, and veil. To date, the performance is noted as one of the iconic and biggest performance in MTV history.[26] Like a Virgin was certified diamond by the Recording Industry Association of America and sold more than 21 million copies worldwide.The National Association of Recording Merchandisers and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame listed the album as one of the Definitive 200 Albums of All Time.
The next year, Madonna entered mainstream films, beginning with a brief appearance as a club singer in Vision Quest, a romantic drama film. Its soundtrack contained her second US number-one single, "Crazy for You". She also appeared in the comedy Desperately Seeking Susan (1985), a film which introduced the song "Into the Groove", her first number-one single in the United Kingdom. Although not the lead actress for the film, her profile was such that the movie widely became seen (and marketed) as a Madonna vehicle. The film received a nomination for a César Award for Best Foreign Film, and The New York Times film critic Vincent Canby, named it as one of the ten best films of 1985, with the lead actress Rosanna Arquette, receiving a supporting actress BAFTA for her role. While filming the music video for the second single from Like a Virgin, titled "Material Girl", Madonna started dating actor Sean Penn and married him on her twenty-seventh birthday that year.
Madonna embarked on her first concert tour in North America, titled The Virgin Tour, with the Beastie Boys as opening acts. In July 1985, Penthouse and Playboy magazines published a number of nude photos of Madonna, taken in New York in 1978. Madonna had posed for the photographs as she was in need of money. But because she had signed the appropriate release forms, she could not take legal action to block them. The publication of the photos caused media uproar, but Madonna remained defiant and unapologetic; she was paid as little as $25 a session. The photographs were ultimately sold for up to $100,000.[36] She referenced this incident at the outdoor Live Aid charity concert and stated that she would not take her jacket off because "they [media] might hold it against me ten years from now."