Scottish Daily Mail

Is this really the best way to win custody of your son, Madonna?

- From Daniel Bates in New York

SHE is in the midst of a fierce custody battle with her ex-husband over their teenage son.

So you might expect Madonna to put aside her usual provocativ­e antics until it is resolved.

Instead, the singer has posted a series of increasing­ly bizarre images on social media site Instagram – claiming they ‘have nothing to do’ with her parenting abilities.

Just hours after a judge called on the 57year-old and her former spouse Guy Ritchie to put aside their difference­s, Madonna shared with her 6.3million followers a video of herself dressed as a clown dancing onstage. The caption read: ‘Tears of a clown.’

It followed a High Court hearing in London on Thursday in which Mr Justice Alistair MacDonald said it was ‘deeply regrettabl­e’ the pair had resorted to lawyers about the fate of their 15-year-old son Rocco.

That same day, Madonna had posted an explicit cartoon showing a woman sitting on a man, using the caption to take a swipe at ‘women-hating idiots’.

She also said the image had ‘nothing to do with my ability to be. [SIC] A Good parent’.

The star has not made any public comment on the case, so her Instagram posts offer a hint at her state of mind. She had earlier shared a photo of herself wearing PVC underwear and holding a whip beside a horse, writing that she was preparing for her current tour in New Zealand.

On Wednesday – when the case was also heard in the Manhattan Supreme Court – she uploaded a quote attributed to artist Frida Kahlo which read: ‘I hope the exit is joyful and I hope never to return.’

She accompanie­d it with the remark: ‘The artist always suffers.’

Her dispute with 47-year-old film director Ritchie, who she divorced in 2008 after eight years of marriage, centres on where Rocco should live.

The teenager had been staying with his mother in New York since the split, but while travelling with her on her Rebel Heart tour in December he refused to go back and stayed with his father in London.

The hearing in England resumes on March 10 while the New York case continues on June 1. On Thursday, Mr Justice MacDonald added that ‘an amicable negotiated resolution is evidently in Rocco’s best interests’.

 ??  ?? ‘Tears of a clown’: She dances in a circus costume
‘Tears of a clown’: She dances in a circus costume
 ??  ?? Provocativ­e: She shared an explicit cartoon
Provocativ­e: She shared an explicit cartoon
 ??  ?? Topless: Posing in an Instagram photo
Topless: Posing in an Instagram photo

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