Trivia / Who's That Girl

• Actor-Inspired Element: The Animated Credits Opening was Madonna's idea.
• Box Office Bomb: Budget – $17–20 million; box office – $7.3 million.
• Breakaway Pop Hit: The soundtrack proved to be more successful than the film itself, thanks to the commercial successes of the title track, "Causing a Commotion" and "The Look of Love".
• Creator Backlash: Director James Foley accepted the failure of this movie:
  I knew it was doomed before even filming started. The day before the first shoot, I sat in my hotel and looked to the script thinking, "Damn, wish I could re-write this whole thing". After the film released, my dad called me up saying "you know The New York Times are calling it the worst film of the year".
• Method Acting: Madonna asked for five minutes to study the script for the scene they were filming. For example, before a scene in which she needed to appear out of breath, she did a series of push-ups before going on-set.
• Never Work with Children or Animals: At one point, the cougar accidentally escaped from its cage, resulting in filming being paused for a few hours.
• Not Screened for Critics: Warner Bros. did not arrange for an advance screening of the movie. They believed that Madonna's popularity would draw moviegoers to it.
• Old Shame: James Foley recalled that he and Madonna chose to overlook the failure of the movie, and remembered one incident when he met her at a hotel lobby.
  She just looked to me once and said, "So it's a flop right?" That's the only time she ever mentioned the film. Even Sean also never mentioned it in front of her.
• What Could Have Been: Madonna initially thought of asking Sean Penn to play Detective Bellson, but he was serving a 60-day jail term, having violated the probation he received in 1986, for assaulting a friend of hers and attacking an extra on the set of At Close Range.
• Working Title: The movie was originally titled Slammer until Madonna wrote "Who's That Girl" and decided to use it as the theme song.

---