\nBy Vamping it up: Lola and Madonna at last week’s Oscars – and now the queen of pop could be on the verge of creating a grotesque double act\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n An uneasy mixture of pride and embarrassment is written all over Lourdes Leon\u2019s face. <\/p>\n She is as tense as a drum in her pretty minidress, watching her mother – all facelift and fishnets \u2014 vamp it up for the cameras at the Vanity Fair party on Oscars night.<\/p>\n Only the fact that Madonna is clutching on to her hand seems to be stopping the teenager from racing off the red carpet and away from the spectacle of her mother flashing her\u00a0 lace-covered buttocks. It must be purgatory, at times, to be Madonna\u2019s daughter.<\/p>\n Of course, there are not many 52-year-olds quite like Madonna. <\/p>\n But then it\u2019s fair to say that there are not many 14-year-olds who are quite like Lourdes, either. <\/p>\n For Lourdes, known as Lola, is possibly the only person brave enough to stand up to her mother. <\/p>\n And, since Madonna\u2019s divorce from Guy Ritchie, she has stepped into a new role as her mother\u2019s best friend and greatest cheerleader.<\/p>\n In fact, after the undoubtedly embarrassing photocall at the Vanity Fair Oscars party this year, the pair happily worked the party together \u2014 still holding hands. Lola supported her mother when, awkwardly, they bumped into Gwyneth Paltrow \u2014 a once-close friend to whom Madonna no longer speaks. <\/p>\n The singer and her daughter blanked her completely.<\/p>\n Afterwards, they went together to a party at music producer Guy Oseary\u2019s house, where they danced together and chatted conspiratorially into the early hours. <\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n If Lola had any embarrassment over her mother\u2019s get-up, she hid it well. Indeed, it is clear (even though she can be such an embarrassment at times) that her \u2018mom\u2019 \u2014 or \u2018motta\u2019 as Lola calls her \u2014 is her hero. Slightly more worryingly, Lola has changed from a studious little thing in specs into a young woman very much in her mother\u2019s image. <\/p>\n Lola once hoped to go to Yale and study law, but now all her focus is on dancing, singing and acting. <\/p>\n She also shares her mother\u2019s two great obsessions: Kabbalah, a mystical branch of the Jewish faith, and exercise. She has a disciplined beauty regimen and a considerable work ethic, too. <\/p>\n Lola is in her second year at the LaGuardia performing academy in New York, where she\u2019s known as the coolest of the cool girls. She already believes her clothing range has made her a style guru and is now planning to launch herself as a singer.<\/p>\n There are even reports she and her mother have been spending time in a recording studio \u2014 entering and leaving separately in order to keep the sessions a secret. <\/p>\n Peas in a pod: Lola shares her mother’s two great obsessions: Kabbalah, a mystical branch of the Jewish faith, and exercise<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Pupils at the LaGuardia academy have noticed Lourdes has been particularly attentive in singing class, working on show tunes so that she can conquer high notes. <\/p>\n So, as they stood together on the Vanity Fair carpet, we may have been seeing the launch of a new phase of Madonna\u2019s extraordinary career \u2014 as part of a double-act with a daughter who is prettier and, by all accounts, rather cleverer than she is.<\/p>\n Lourdes Maria Ciccone Leon was born on October 14, 1996, by caesarean section, at the Good Samaritan Hospital in Los Angeles. Her father, Carlos Leon, was present at the birth but was never going to be an equal party in the relationship. <\/p>\n He caught Madonna\u2019s eye while they were jogging in Central Park in the autumn of 1994. She put him on the payroll as her fitness instructor. <\/p>\n By the end of 1995, they had split.\u00a0 The break-up was so acrimonious that she changed the locks at her New York apartment. However, early the following year she became pregnant by him.<\/p>\n For Madonna, who lost her mother at six to cancer, her birth was overwhelmingly joyous. <\/p>\n She told Vanity Fair: \u2018I knew that having a child would be an incredible healing experience. Because I didn\u2019t have a mother, I just knew my karma was to have a girl.\u2019 <\/p>\n Madonna was determined that, even though she is worth $250\u00a0million, her daughter would not turn out to be a spoiled brat.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n She and Carlos split again when Lola was still just a toddler, sleeping in a crib at the end of her mother\u2019s bed. She was said to have given Carlos a considerable financial settlement for exiting the liaison quietly. <\/p>\n In 1998, Madonna met Guy Ritchie. They were married shortly after Lola\u2019s fourth birthday, in 2000.\u00a0 <\/p>\n Madonna made England her home and chose a life for Lola a world away from the ramshackle working-class upbringing in Michigan that she has struggled through. Lola attended the private Lycee Francais school in London, and was raised as bilingual in French. <\/p>\n From the outset, she was a straight-A student. Madonna insisted that Lola had to focus on her studies and work hard \u2014 indeed, visitors to the house say she was always stricter with Lola than she was with her younger son Rocco, whose father is Guy Ritchie.<\/p>\n Homework was strictly scheduled and there was no television for either child, apart from at weekends. Lola took dance classes in the early mornings and Spanish and Italian tuition after school.<\/p>\n Her diet was controlled \u2014 like the rest of the family, she was only offered organic, macrobiotic foods. Ice cream and cakes were strictly for birthdays only. Her time with Madonna was scheduled into the singer\u2019s diary weeks in advance.<\/p>\n By the time Lola was 12 she had an allowance of \u00a310 a week, which could be docked for failure to tidy her room and make her bed. Madonna was determined that, even though she is worth $250\u00a0million, her daughter would not turn out to be a spoiled brat.<\/p>\n There are, naturally, upsides to being Madonna\u2019s child. When she was eight, Lourdes did work experience with Stella McCartney. She also began to have weekly facials, manicures and pedicures, a habit which she still retains. She travelled the world, often by private jet.<\/p>\n Support: Madonna and daughter Lola are very close – the latter supported her mother in blanking Gwyneth Paltrow at the Vanity Fair Oscar’s party last week<\/p>\n<\/div>\n When she was 12, she started to pester her mother for acting lessons. Madonna said no, but when she separated from Guy Ritchie, she relented. <\/p>\n The family relocated to New York and home for Madonna, Lola, Rocco and David Banda, the five-year-old she adopted in Malawi, became a magnificent apartment in Harperley Hall, a grand Edwardian block on the corner of Central Park West and 64th Street.<\/p>\n Lola began attending the New York branch of the Lycee Francais school, but insisted on cycling there without bodyguards across Central Park. Lola told her mother that it would be too embarrassing if she was dropped off by chauffeur.<\/p>\n She also made further visits to Malawi with her mother, as the star struggled to adopt four-year-old Mercy James. Sources close to the family say Lola encouraged her mother to press on with the adoption, despite public criticism.<\/p>\n With Guy Ritchie out of the picture and Madonna enjoying Lola\u2019s company, the singer allowed her daughter to appear in her video for the hit Celebration and even to come on stage with her in Tel Aviv.<\/p>\n Lola hangs out with a small clique of Kabbalah kids, who attend services at the Church\u2019s midtown Manhattan headquarters.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span> <\/p>\n She was then allowed to enroll in the LaGuardia High School of Music & Art. She started there last September and on her first day wore a rasta-style bracelet printed with pictures of marijuana leaves.\u00a0 <\/p>\n Her fellow pupils say she is an exemplary student.<\/p>\n \u2018Everyone knows who she is,\u2019 a parent of a fellow 14-year-old said outside the school. <\/p>\n \u2018She doesn\u2019t need to introduce herself, yet she mumbles her name so quietly you have to lean in to catch it.<\/p>\n \u2018She comes across as quite shy. But whether she realises it or not, she is way cool. She knows how to dress, how to accessorise and how to carry herself.\u2019<\/p>\n Aside from basic lessons in maths, English, science and history, Lola is sampling the different art classes the school has to offer. By this coming September she will have to decide whether to concentrate on singing, dancing or drama \u2014 or opt for behind-the-camera technical classes in theatre and film making.<\/p>\n On her blog, Lola wrote: \u2018I started at my new high school and it\u2019s great! I love it!! The drama classes are really fun and so are the people. It\u2019s totally chill and awesome.\u2019<\/p>\n Following suit: A fresh-faced Madonna at the start of her musical journey – could her daughter be set to follow her lead?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n However, her classmates aren\u2019t invited to her home, a brisk five-minute stroll away on Central Park West. Instead, Lola hangs out with a small clique of Kabbalah kids, who attend services at the Church\u2019s midtown Manhattan headquarters. She is devout enough to go to the Friday night services sometimes without her mother. <\/p>\n One source said: \u2018They are extremely similar, even though Lola is going through a phase of talking as if she was an idiot valley girl (the LA equivalent of an Essex girl). Since Madonna and Guy split, Lola has spent all of her time with her mum. <\/p>\n \u2018They have certainly become closer than ever. Madonna has fallen out with nearly all of the women who used to support her \u2014 her nannies and PAs and her trainer Tracey Anderson, as well\u2019. Lola has come to be the one person who Madonna can rely upon. <\/p>\n \u2018We all hear that Guy and his girlfriend Jacqui Ainsley are hoping to start a family and that will be a big blow to Madonna, so she\u2019s likely to need Lola more than ever. They really are a tight unit of two.\u2019<\/p>\n Last year saw the launch of their first joint venture, the Material Girl fashion line. It\u2019s not designed by either of them, but Lola has creative input. Madonna explained: \u2018She is really doing most of the work. She shows me things and I go \u201cthat\u2019s cool\u201d or \u201cthat\u2019s not cool\u201d.\u2019 <\/p>\n This season, Lola styled Kelly Osbourne for the shoots. She\u2019s clearly \u2014like her mother \u2014 not short of confidence. <\/p>\n Madonna has given her a cameo role in the film WE, the story of Wallis Simpson and King Edward VIII\u2019s romance which the star produced and directed. Lola plays a schoolgirl in one scene.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/p>\n Her only giddiness seems to revolve around clothes and bands. The discovery of a pair of desirable lace-up sandals is greeted wildly on her blog. \u2018Giddy god!\u2019 she exclaims. She also writes \u2018Oh my daiz!\u2019 and \u2018Shay Shay coulaye\u2019. A major crisis is being rained on after blowdrying her hair, which rates as \u2018DEPRESSOR\u2019.<\/p>\n In one post she writes: \u2018I\u2019m like re-decorating my room kind of, and I spent like a bajillion dollars on posters. I think it looks pretty cool.\u2019 <\/p>\n Her father Carlos Leon, who is starting to make it as an actor, says he is relieved that she\u2019s not dating yet. He sees her most weekends. He used to cycle home from school with her when it was dark.<\/p>\n The two of them like to watch Twilight DVDs together and Lola is said to have a crush on actor Robert Pattinson, who stars in the films. <\/p>\n Carlos tries to impose a 10pm weekend curfew, but otherwise allows her to roam around town with her friends. \u2018I\u2019m a lenient dad. I\u2019m very empathetic and I\u2019m good at listening to my daughter. I\u2019m probably a bad dad when it comes to disciplining her,\u2019 he said. <\/p>\n Madonna considers her little girl to be pretty much grown up \u2014 she finds her way unchaperoned through airports already, for instance. Of course, there are arguments \u2014 mostly over what she can wear. <\/p>\n In a recent interview, Madonna said: \u2018School\u2019s not a nightclub, that\u2019s what I say to her. Do you want everybody to be staring at your breasts, or do you want people to talk to you? <\/p>\n \u2018The rules are no shorts without tights and no low tops. Every once in a while, she\u2019ll like something and I\u2019ll go: \u201cNo way Lola. You can\u2019t wear that.\u201d And then she\u2019ll put it on and make it work and talk me into it. It\u2019s hard to say no to Lola.\u2019\u00a0 <\/p>\n Especially, you suspect, if you are in the habit of wearing a leotard and fishnet tights to a party. <\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\nAlison Boshoff<\/a> and Annette Witheridge<\/a>
Last updated at 1:14 AM on 5th March 2011<\/p>\n![\"Vamping](\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/18b79b2b148_233x460.jpg\")
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