Madonna‘s team has responded after a pair of ticketholders sued the singer for late starts on her Celebration Tour in the US.
The now-former fans say the performer exhibited “flippant difficulty” in starting her recent string of Brooklyn concerts on time, court records show.
“Madonna’s just completed, sold out 2023 Celebration Tour in Europe received rave reviews,” a joint statement from Live Nation and Madonna’s management shared with CNN on Wednesday (Thursday AEDT) read.
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“The shows opened in North America at Barclays in Brooklyn as planned, with the exception of a technical issue December 13th during soundcheck. This caused a delay that was well documented in press reports at the time.”
“We intend to defend this case vigorously.”
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The lawsuit against the entertainer – filed on January 17 in New York, and obtained by CNN the next day – accused her of false advertising and negligent misrepresentation after the singer started her concerts at Brooklyn’s Barclays Centre last month after 10.30pm on all three nights, when the tickets advertised that the shows would start at 8.30pm.
The suit claims that most concertgoers left the venue after 1am each night, causing them significant inconvenience, including being “confronted with limited public transportation, limited ride-sharing, and/or increased public and private transportation costs at that late hour.”
“In addition, many ticketholders who attended concerts on a weeknight had to get up early to go to work and/or take care of their family responsibilities the next day,” the complaint read.
The lawsuit cites Madonna as a defendant, along with tour operator and promoter Live Nation Worldwide; Live Nation M Tours; and Brooklyn Events Centre, which does business as Barclays Centre.
The proposed class of plaintiffs includes ticketholders for her tour throughout the US, and the plaintiffs are asking for an undisclosed amount in damages to be determined at trial.
“Defendants have collected money for concert tickets from plaintiffs and other class members who reasonably believed the concerts would promptly begin at 8.30pm. Had plaintiffs and other class members known that the concerts would start after 10.30pm, they never would have agreed to purchase the tickets,” the complaint read.
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The plaintiffs involved in the proposed class action “demand judgment against defendants for actual and consequential damages”.
The Brooklyn concerts in question took place on December 13, 14 and 16 of last year, and constituted the beginning of the North American leg of Madonna’s Celebration Tour.
The shows were originally scheduled for July of 2023, but had to be rescheduled when Madonna was hospitalised last June after developing a serious bacterial infection.
This is not the first time Madonna has faced legal troubles for starting her shows more than fashionably late.
In 2019, during her Madame X theatre tour, the pop icon was similarly sued for starting her show at 10.30pm.
A concertgoer at one of Madonna’s Miami concerts in December 2019 alleged that the artist and Live Nation changed the start time for his show and several others – which were initially scheduled to start at 8.30pm to 10.30pm.
That lawsuit alleged that the change in start times for Madonna’s Madame X Tour was a breach of contract between the singer and the ticket buyer.