The Halftime Headache

In the beginning, the Super Bowl was about football. It was about two competing leagues, a merger, MVP’s and the Lombardi trophy.

But as the years went by, the Super Bowl became more than just a football game. We loved football so much that it was dubbed the de facto holiday “Super Bowl Sunday” so we could drink, eat and scream at the television. The football game has become a football event, complete with mass food consumption, the coveted million dollar commercial spots, and of course the half time show.

For a performer, the chance to star in the Super Bowl halftime show is more valuable than almost anything. The Super Bowl is one of the most viewed television programs of the year, a dream for even the most successful of artists. The exposure alone has been shown to prompt huge spikes in album sales and music downloads. The event has naturally evolved over the years, until recently it hit a wall of controversy that it hasn’t been able to overcome.

I think we all know what I’m talking about. Janet Jackson’s boob is still ingrained into my innocent thirteen year-old brain. For the folks in charge, it was enough to ban MTV and all young “popular” artists from the Super Bowl for six years.

If you take a look at Super Bowl I, there is no indication that it would become what it is today. The first halftime shows featured local marching bands from colleges and high schools. It wasn’t until Carol Channing’s performance during Super Bowl IV that prompted interest in bigger names in entertainment.

Another turning point came in 1993, when Michael Jackson made the halftime show one of the most watched television events in history. It was the first halftime show to be aired in its entirety, setting the standard for the rest to follow. Ratings for his performance were higher than the game itself. There was some concern over the amount of crotch-grabbing, but nobody seemed exceptionally worried. Not yet at least.

Network execs had begun to treat halftime as a program in of itself. There was a new determination to have famous “hip” performers at halftime.

In 1996, Diana Ross was a sensation with a performance that included four costume changes and a grand exit via helicopter while belting “Take Me Higher.” 1998 was a Motown tribute featuring Boyz II Men, Smokey Robinson, The Temptations, Martha Reeves and Queen Latifa. The next few years were headlined with artists such as Christina Aguilera, Gloria Esefan, Phil Collins and Enrique Iglesias.

2001, the only other MTV produced halftime before the nipple incident, saw the height of young entertainment at the Super Bowl, particularly with a line up consisting of NSYNC, Aerosmith, Britney Spears and Nelly.

But the halftime show most of us remember clearly is the 2004 Janet Jackson performance that ended with an unfortunate “wardrobe malfunction.” During what many have come to call “Nipplegate” Justin Timberlake ripped off a piece of Jackson’s costume to reveal a pierced nipple. The incident led to a heavy crackdown on indecency in broadcasting. CBS was slapped with a $550,000 fine and banned MTV from producing any more halftime shows.

It was in many ways a peak and tipping point for Super Bowl entertainment. The show was highly produced featuring six artists with eight different numbers. With Jackson’s dancers writhing about suggestively, enough pyrotechnics to set the stadium on fire and half-naked cheerleaders, it was enough to make even the more liberal viewer worried. Apparently this is where the line was drawn between family entertainment and a rave.

In the years that followed, the halftime show was reduced to only one artist at a time, almost all of them classic rock (Paul McCartney, The Rolling Stones, Prince, Tom Petty, Bruce Springsteen and The Who). In 2006, a five second delay was implemented to help censor and prevent indecent images. What used to be a party for drunken football fans became more of a traditional concert, leaving more youthful fans disappointed.

Which is why the scheduled performance of The Black Eyed Peas is so notable. It is the first time since 2004 that a woman will be headlining the show, let alone anybody under the age of 40. Perhaps this is a way of easing back into the more popular artists. In future years, more than one artist might even be aloud on stage again. What made the halftime shows great was bringing together our favorites from different genres, like Gloria Estefan and Stevie Wonder, or No Doubt and Sting.

But the older crowd shouldn’t be worried. My fifty-something mother tells me how much she loves that “I’ve Got a Feeling” song. Maybe The Peas could be the group to bridge the generation gap. Plus, they’ve promised not to perform “My Humps.”

All we can do is hope everything goes well.

And that Fergie wears a bra.