Madonna Talks New Tour & Tells Anderson Cooper She's Living the Life Her Mom Could Not at Q&A

Madonna was full of surprises at the Tribeca Film Festival premiere of her short film "Confessions II," sitting for a free-wheeling interview with buddy Anderson Cooper that thrilled a sold-out crowd at NYC's Beacon Theater.

The Friday-night screening, originally set for 8 p.m. and bumped to 9, was due to have been moderated by Jimmy Fallon. When Fallon bowed out last-minute, that left Cooper to fill in.

Around 9:30, the Queen of Pop, 67, arrived via a side entrance escorted by her boyfriend Akeem Morris, 30.

Madonna was clad in a short, white, form-fitting, sparkly dress under a glamorous fluffy coat. Rocking movie-star shades, she made her way through the crowd, shaking hands as she slinked past the entire front row (nobody seemed to mind the tight squeeze) to the couple's seats on the sixth-row aisle.

Throughout her journey, she was given a standing O, offering a delighted bow in response.

Madonna and Morris were seated with her son David Banda, 20, and daughters Lourdes Leon — who appears in "Confessions II" — and Mercy James, 29 and 20, respectively.

Also seated nearby were rapper Feid, who collabs with Madonna on the new album the short film promotes — "Confessions on a Dance Floor Part II," due out July 3 — director Jonas Åkerlund, and actress Debi Mazar. A close friend of Madonna's, with her cameo in "Confessions II," Mazar has now appeared more of the music powerhouse's videos than anyone else across 40 years.

The film, directed by duo TORSO (David Toro & Solomon Chase), is a wild 10-minute ride that is structured around showcasing six tracks from her new album: "I Feel So Free," "Good for the Soul," "One Step Away," "Bring Your Love," "Danceteria," and "Read My Lips."

Posting to YouTube on Monday, the film includes a crazy scene in an alien world in which laser beams shoot from dancers' — well, not from their fingertips. There are scenes of Madonna flying over a rave ("I did all my own stunts!" she would later tell the crowd); flipping her hair and turning into Julia Garner (who she still hopes will one day play her in a movie about her life); standing like a giantess with a blinding sun shining from between her legs; and presiding over a bonkers bathroom scene meant to convey the druggy energy of what it was like inside the fabled NYC club Danceteria, where Madonna cut her teeth as a nightlife figure before persuading its DJ, the late Mark Kamins, to play her demo.

It's also noteworthy for featuring a raft of celeb cameos: Kate Moss, Benedict Cumberbatch ("A good dancer and very game!"), Gwendoline Christie, Archie Madekwe, Arca, Odessa A'Zion, Richard E. Grant, Shygirl, Honey Dijon and more are seen in the film.

After rapturous applause, Madonna took the stage with her directors, graciously answering Cooper's queries and taking her fans on a 90-minute journey that touched on many aspects of her life and career, not just the film at hand.

Regarding her album, she revealed that one song, "The Test," was co-written with her daughter Lourdes, of whom she conceded, "I'm a fierce bitch, but she is so much more talented."

Speaking of motherhood, she told Cooper she had not known if she would be a good mom, but advised, "If you wanna grow up, have a kid," teasing him that he's still in the honeymoon phase raising his own young children. She warned that things would change when hormones kicked in.

Reflecting on her attention-grabbing pop-up concert from the day before, she admitted that standing on the TSX stage and gazing out over Times Square, she thought, "Wow, I made it." Cooper was shocked it took until now to feel that way, but Madonna explained that since Times Square was the "center of everything" where she'd been dropped off by a cabbie the day she arrived in NYC, the idea that she was singing her music to thousands of fans there all these years later touched her.

Asked if the well-received gig meant she could tour again, she was cagey. Expressing a desire to perform again, she said didn't want to repeat herself and was thinking how cool it would be to perform in a cube dropped into the middle of an audience.

When one fan shouted out that she should do Sphere, she was ready, saying, "Sphere seems cool, but I don't want to wake up and look at Vegas every day."

More philosophically, she painted her life in terms of her response to losing her mom, for whom she is named, at age 5. "I'm living the life she never had a chance to live," she said.

Continuing on the topic of death, she acknowledged being grateful to be alive — chalking it up to not being a smoker or drinker — and said how awkward it feels to talk about other performers who came up with her since so many are dead.

One of the most unusual aspects of the talk was that nobody was recording it on their phones. That's because the event used Yondr, which locks phones up. Madonna said she loved performing at Coachella with Sabrina Carpenter last month, but is always disappointed to see so many phones instead of eyes.

She reckons it's always better to, "Put your phones down, go out, and connect with people," saying she wants to be a doer, not a documenter.

At the end of the Q&A, Madonna invited fans to stick around to watch the short one more time while she exited.

"Confessions II" will appear on Madonna's YouTube account Monday, joining her newly released album track "Love Sensation," which just went up late last week.