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- [00:00]
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- [00:18]
Stephen Thompson
At the super bowl halftime show, Bad Bunny put on an endlessly rewatchable performance. It featured Lady Gaga and Ricky Martin and even had a real life wedding. It was filled with dancing and unabashed joy, but it didn't shy away from this political moment and Bad Bunny's place in the culture wars. I'm Stephen Thompson. Today on NPR's Pop Culture Happy Hour, we are teaming up with. It's been a minute for a recap of the super bowl halftime show. Here's host Brittany Luce.
- [00:49]
Brittany Luce
Okay, y', all, we all just witnessed the Bad Bunny halftime show. First impressions. What words are running through your mind?
- [00:57]
Alana Casanova Burgess
Joy. Excitement. Wepa. This was for Puerto Ricans. I was so gagged, sitting in my living room watching it all unfold. I was screaming, sorry if my voice is a little hoarse.
- [01:10]
Brittany Luce
That's all right. That's all right.
- [01:11]
Stephen Thompson
I mean, there's so much to unpack in this performance. This is an endlessly rewatchable performance because there is so much text and subtext. But as far as first impressions and the first thing that I'm taking away, I think this is one of the top five super bowl halftime shows of all time.
- [01:27]
Brittany Luce
Yeah, I think you're right.
- [01:28]
Stephen Thompson
I think Prince, for me, is probably still number one. But this is up there with Beyonce. This is up there with some of the all time great super bowl halftime shows. Just as a piece of stagecraft, as a piece of just joyful performance. So much movement, the camera work. This was an extraordinary technical accomplishment. And we'll get to how joyful it was, you know, just as an experience, how much it meant to this hemisphere. But I just. Just to take a step back right at the beginning, I think this is one of the all time great super bowl halftime shows.
- [02:12]
Brittany Luce
I was still processing it. I mean, I'm very glad we're talking about this right now. Moments ago, we all witnessed the Bad Bunny super bowl halftime show. And. And we are here to break down what happened in the performance and why it mattered. And to do that, we are here with music and entertainment critic Rihanna.
- [02:26]
Alana Casanova Burgess
Cruz, Happy to be here.
- [02:28]
Brittany Luce
And Alana Casanova Burgess, host of La Brega podcast. Hello. I mean, honestly, my mind is blank. I just am like, okay, Puerto Rico flag emoji, crying emoji, vibrating heart emoji.
- [02:46]
Rihanna Cruz
I still have goosebumps. And it's Been like an hour.
- [02:49]
Alana Casanova Burgess
My phone was blowing up. I catched up on all my text messages. People being like, are you seeing what's happening right now? I FaceTime my brother. Like, crazy stuff is going on.
- [03:00]
Brittany Luce
Listen, my mom, my sister FaceTimed me right after it was over to say that our mom said that if she had a son, she would name him Benito.
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Wow.
- [03:10]
Brittany Luce
My mother, by the way, is not having any more children at 70, so suffice it to say she felt very strongly.
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Stephen Thompson
She feels like anything is possible.
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Sponsor/Advertisement Voice
Any.
- [03:21]
Brittany Luce
Right. And that's what Bonito said. He said, believe in yourself. Okay, so I will note that we are taping this about an hour after the performance. So I know it's incredibly fresh. I know it's incredibly fresh. But Alana, Rihanna, what moments are sticking with you?
- [03:33]
Rihanna Cruz
Oh, I mean, the parade of American nations. Towards the end, we see Benito with the light blue Puerto Rican flag. Right. Very important. And then he says, together we are all America.
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Right?
- [03:48]
Rihanna Cruz
Is that right? And he's holding a. Something akin to that. And it's also in his football with like, together in all caps. And then he starts saying, like, just every country. Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru, God bless America.
- [04:03]
Brittany Luce
Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay.
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Rihanna Cruz
And he shouted out United States. And he shouted out Puerto Rico. And we see just a parade of flags of all of the nations of the Americas. And there we see the other Puerto Rican flag, the official one, and it was stunning. It was like a parade of nations.
- [04:26]
Alana Casanova Burgess
I mean, I agree, I'm in a similar boat that. That lasting image of the parade of flags and kind of reframing the idea of what God bless America means as something that extends to both north and South America and Central America and the Caribbean, et cetera, et cetera. Like, I thought that was really remarkable, but I think I'm really staying with the image of Ricky Martin singing Lo que le paso a Hawaii, which is a very strong song about the idea of decolonizing both Puerto Rico and Hawaii and all colonized territories.
- [05:09]
Brittany Luce
Like, it's a specifically not turning point puerto Rico into 51st state.
- [05:13]
Alana Casanova Burgess
Like, exactly, exactly. And. And kind of like a condemnation of what colonization is. I thought that was really powerful to have that on the super bowl stage and have someone like Ricky Martin who was and still is one of the biggest crossover Puerto Rican musicians of all time. When Ricky Martin came into the music industry, he was straddling these two worlds of like English speaking music and the Latin music industry. And I think his biggest hits, he had to kind of record English and Spanish versions. Right? Like, he had to live in both of these worlds, he had to kind of fetishize his own culture for success and things of that nature. And to kind of have Ricky Martin singing this really powerful song that, like, is so pro Puerto Rican independence was really, really powerful for me. And that's, you know, I'm a little monster. That's not even going into the Lady Gaga.
- [06:26]
Stephen Thompson
I was gonna say. I can't believe Rihanna has gone this far without talking about Lady Gaga showing up at this point.
- [06:32]
Alana Casanova Burgess
Lady Gaga came on stage. I came. I kid you not. I got eight text messages in a row from people that I haven't talked to since college. Like, it was really amazing, I have to say.
- [06:42]
Rihanna Cruz
I was watching it with four other people, and we were all like, who is that? Who's this blonde lady on my screen? And I'm in, like, Puerto Rico mode. So I'm, like, skimming through, like, every person I know. I'm like, who is it? Who is it? Who is it? Who is it? And then someone said, I think that's Lady Gaga. And we're all like, no way. What would she be doing there?
- [07:02]
Brittany Luce
Yeah, I was very surprised to see see her. But I'll tell you what, that salsa version of Die with a Smile, I know, Listen, that slapped.
- [07:10]
Alana Casanova Burgess
I was like, let me drop a little bit of Lady Gaga history on you. She has always been here for the Latino community. This is something that she's highlighted throughout the course of her career. She sang songs in Spanish. She really, like, is tapped in to the pequenos monstros, you know, her Spanish little monster fan base. It's always been part of her. A very strong part of her artistry, really, over the years and her performing that, I was like, oh, it's giving Evita. Like she was in her Evita bag.
- [07:45]
Brittany Luce
Oh, my God.
- [07:47]
Stephen Thompson
Absolutely.
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Brittany Luce
I feel like she was more in her La Isla Bonita Modona. After she was done, I was like, madonna is somewhere.
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Alana Casanova Burgess
Madonna.
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Brittany Luce
Watch herself banging her against the table, like, with jealousy. Because I definitely. I remember Madonna's Puerto Rican face. Lord.
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Alana Casanova Burgess
Oh, absolutely. Spanish lesson off of Hard Candy. Nobody wants to talk about that?
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Stephen Thompson
No.
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Brittany Luce
Okay, so I want to. We've touched on so many different things already, but I think that that highlights, like, one of the big themes of. Of the show, which was just like, this performance is about world building. Like, Bad Bunny was inviting us to Puerto Rico from the very start. I mean, the first images that we see are look, like jibaros, like, like, kind of, you know, like farmers on a sugar cane farm plantation, like, cutting sugar cane Cortando G, bring that visual, obviously, to the football field. Now, the African American in me is like, plantation football field, NFL combine. I went full, like, Dr. Umar, like, with my cookie on, where I'm like, there's levels to this concert spirit right here. There are levels. I'm like, he's telling y' all to wake up. I don't know if he read all of that, but I will say it does kind of speak to. It speaks to the Caribbean diaspora. It speaks to the African diaspora, speaks to the slave trade, but it also speaks specifically to Puerto Rican history. I thought that was really interesting. But I want to hear from you all. How would you describe the story he was trying to tell and what moments really captured that for each of you? Stephen, I wanna start with you on this one, boy.
- [09:27]
Stephen Thompson
I mean, where to begin? Cause I'm still looking at this show from 10,000ft in a way, and thinking about it kind of in the context of all the culture war stuff surrounding it in the weeks leading up to this performance and how much this performance, as much as it has these layers and layers, and we're gonna get to the storytelling in a second and how it moves through, you know, the sugar plantations and ultimately where he's, like, giving a Grammy to his younger self, and all these different things that we can unpack at the same time from 10,000ft. I'm still thinking about how wholesome this show felt in a lot of ways, how unifying this show felt and how the. And I mean this in the best possible way, in the most complimentary way, how inoffensive this show was in the aftermath of these weeks and weeks of buildup in which he has been kind of disparaged and kind of people trying to tear him down. And, you know, alternate. You know, the alternate version of this halftime show that Turning Point USA put together with Kid Rock and all these different things where you had it. Suddenly, this show became this flashpoint in the culture war, where it was seen as deeply offensive to a whole bunch of people in this country. But then you watch this show, and how could you think that? And I think that in its own way, as much as we can unpack, like, this was political. This was political. This is art. This is narrative. This is. You know, if you know the history of this, then this comes out. As much as we're unpacking that stuff just as a pure piece of spectacle, this was a piece of unifying theater. This was just a piece of spectacular entertainment. And so, for me, I'm still kind of Thinking about, and I want to hear thoughts about the details of the storytelling. But I'm still viewing this thing from 10,000ft and just marveling at what a spectacular piece of unifying entertainment this was. How much I felt a sense of patriotism, a sense of unity, a sense of, you know, being a part of this. This bigger and more expansive and beautiful.
- [11:43]
Brittany Luce
World, specifically a world that is larger than just the United States, Right? And as like. And as we've been discussing, a sense of the Americas and not just America, and almost inherent in that felt like a remark on perhaps the futility of borders and these lines that are drawn from country to country. I felt like he was making a statement that express that they are useful. So, like, as in, as far as they can bring community and pride. And then beyond that, beyond that, there is some way more room for fluidity there than we currently, I think, than we currently bring, I think, to the very United States interpretation of what a border is and is supposed to be.
- [12:28]
Rihanna Cruz
Yeah, I mean, I watched it from outside of the United States. I watched it from the Dominican Republic, and there were watch parties in town today. I've never seen that before. I mean, people were excited. People were glued in. In terms of the wholesomeness, Stephen, that you were just talking about, there was this moment. I don't know if we're like, you know, going from the 10,000, let's, like, drill, drill down in. But there was this moment, right, when he's doing the ditime pregunto, where he's, like, going through all the girls, right? Like LA Sofia Naniko, right? And then he picks out the engagement ring, right, from the jeweler, right? And then he's like, no, I'm not gonna propose to her. Right? Muchacho de hay. So. So then he gives the ring to this couple, they get engaged. Then, you know, he turns around. The next thing we know, we're at a wedding, other people are getting married. And what is more wholesome and beautiful than a wedding? And it was a very Latino wedding. You had, like, the kid asleep on the chair that he had to wake up. It was just there were so many details. And I was thinking, you know, Stephen, when you said, like, this is such a rich text. It absolutely is. I was also thinking, wow, he nailed everything. Like, you know, when you go to a Bad Bunny concert, you're not gonna see him do complicated choreography like his Beyonce, right? That's not what you're going to go see. But he nailed every point of that story, right? He nailed, like, every look in the camera, every line that he was saying, it was just so clear. Like, the portrait that he was painting of us. And it was so. It was so fun. Like, I was like, oh, I've been to that wedding.
- [14:10]
Alana Casanova Burgess
Yeah, how lovely. I think. So there we are.
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Rihanna Cruz
I don't know what Lady Gaga's doing there, but, like, it's great.
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Alana Casanova Burgess
Yeah. But I think something that Bad Bunny did really well on this note, right, is reframing joy as a radical act. And there were overt moments of protest in the performance and in the whole, like, mise en scene of the halftime show. But I think at its core, it's a show that centered joy and joy as resistance. And I think, like, with the way that the United States is treating the Latino community right now, it feels wrong to celebrate in some ways. And I think that because Benito centered, like, a good time, right? He centered a wedding. He centered these moments of having fun. Like, I think of the two men dancing pereo on screen.
- [15:14]
Brittany Luce
I was at a party. Everybody was screamed with joy.
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Alana Casanova Burgess
My jaw dropped, literally, because I was just so taken aback by the idea of, like, centering this joy and dance and framing it as an act of resistance.
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Rihanna Cruz
I think you're totally right. Like, it's okay. It's okay. It's okay. It really is.
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Alana Casanova Burgess
Like, it's okay to be happy, you know? Like, I was sitting in my living room surrounded by my friends, and we were all getting choked up. It was the same thing with the Grammys last week. Like, when Bad Bunny won album of the year, like, all the Latinos in the room, myself included, started crying. Like, it feels like a win for the community. And it feels so radical to have the biggest celebrity in the world really, like, speak for your people and say, it's okay to dance. It's okay to have fun and feel good and dance Pedeo and, you know, smile and stuff like that. Like, it's exciting. I don't know. It really. It's heartwarming.
- [16:13]
Brittany Luce
You know, one moment that immediately jumped out to me and many people watching was when Bad Bunny handed a Grammy to a young Latino boy. And I took that. I initially took that. I mean, he doesn't just hand the Grammy to a young Latino boy. It's like a young Latino boy he's watched, sitting on a couch with his parents, watching Bad Bunny from last Sunday give his acceptance speech for, I think, album of the year at the Grammys. And the camera pauses on this little boy for a few seconds, which is notable, right? Because this is, to Steven's point, A show with incredible stagecraft and camera movements and choreo and like, it was just, it was like there's so much going on, so much motion, but so to stop on just one person for that long who wasn't moving, who was just a little boy smiling and holding this Grammy Award. I think to a lot of people, it definitely felt notable whatever the moment was. The reaction online, though, was speculation that the boy was Liam Conejo Ramos, a five year old boy that the Trump administration has been aiming to deport. NPR Music confirmed with Bad Bunny's team that that was not Liam Conejo Ramos. But I do think it says a lot about this moment and this performance that the immediate online speculation turned to that as a possibility so quickly.
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Rihanna Cruz
Yeah, I mean, I almost want to amend what I said before. Like, it's not okay, but wouldn't you so much rather live in the world that Bad Bunny built for us today than the other world we've been seeing? Right. And of course, we look at that kid and we think, I don't know, we can all discuss whether we thought it was or not, but that kid looked like Liam to me. It's also Conejo is Bunny in Spanish. So I've always, since this story came out, it's, you know, tugged it at me, tugged at all of us. Right. But like, it could definitely be him. And I think for us, like, we know what Benito looked like as a kid. We've seen the pictures. And that kid.
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Yeah.
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Rihanna Cruz
I mean, it's impossible right now to see the show and not think that.
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Brittany Luce
I think the place where my brain did go was like, this child is the age, right. And size so tiny of the, you know, four, five and six year olds that, that, you know, our government has been separating from their families or deporting or locking in detention centers. I think that for so many of us, that's front of mind right now. And it's impossible, at least for me, it has been impossible not to look at any child and not have that be the first thing that comes to mind. So in this highly choreographed, very intentional performance, that long shot on that kid that was like, not specifically this young boy, Liam, but that, that this thing that's happening overall, the detention and deportation of children is one of the first things that popped into my head more broadly coming up.
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Really?
- [19:26]
Stephen Thompson
This is offensive to you? Think about why this is offensive to you.
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Brittany Luce
After a quick break.
- [19:35]
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- [20:35]
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- [21:10]
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- [21:31]
Brittany Luce
That bad Bunny in so many ways felt like he was really speaking directly to the audience. It was a performance to be seen for sure. But I mean, but this is also a performance that was meant to be heard. There was the Jumbotron message at the end that read, the only thing more powerful than hate is love. Which is I felt like a callback to me to Bad Bunny's acceptance speech or one of his acceptance speeches at the Grammys last weekend.
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Alana Casanova Burgess
Totally.
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Brittany Luce
And there was the football Bad Bunny threw to the ground at the end, which had the words together we are America written on it. There were.
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Stephen Thompson
He spiked it because he knew what had just happened.
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Brittany Luce
And this is why we have you here, Steven, because I don't know, there.
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Rihanna Cruz
Was a football game.
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Stephen Thompson
So he threw the football to the ground like woo thunk. And that is signifying that signifies success.
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Brittany Luce
Oh, okay. Well, there you go. And see, this is why we this is why we have you Here he.
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Alana Casanova Burgess
Knew he killed it though, because at the end when everybody was singing DTMF and you see him take out his in ears and the mic cuts off because he wanted that last moment to be with him and everybody on the field with him. I thought that was really special too. Like, you could tell that this meant a lot to him.
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Stephen Thompson
I think by saying explicitly messages like believe in yourself and like, love is better than hate. Like, if you divorce those statements from the show that we just watched, they could be, they could be painted behind the. On the end zone of any given NFL game where they like paint end racism, you know, on the, on the, you know, where it's like where the NFL has, has adopted tons of kind of boilerplate statements. Pro love, anti hate. Right? But within the context of the show, they felt meaningful, they felt radical. And they, as I said kind of earlier in this conversation, they just undercut all of the culture war claptrap that surrounded the lead in to this show. Like, really, you're offended by love is better than hate. You're offended by believe in yourself. You're offended by we're all human beings and we all deserve love and respect. Like, that's some like, shocking, radical statement. So I think in a way, some of the implicit messaging is like, really, this is offensive to you? Think about why this is offensive to you. Because it really, like, nothing that's being said here is actually offensive to you if you think about it.
- [24:07]
Alana Casanova Burgess
Well, that's why when the performance was announced, you know, and it was announced that Bad Bunny was going to be the halftime performer, like, I had kind of a sour taste in my mouth. Especially the show coming after an album that is so anti colonial and so pro Puerto Rico, mostly because of this history that the NFL has with racism. And I just felt that was at odds with what Bad Bunny is trying to do as an. And how radical of a performer Bad Bunny is, how radical his messaging is both in and out of his lyrics. It took me a second to kind of get over that, so to speak. Eventually I ended up at a point where I. I've kind of reconciled, you know, the politics of the NFL with the fact that Bad Bunny is inherently radical. Like I said earlier, like, Joy's resistance, I think is really powerful and important, but at the same time, like, do we want to fit inside small boxes? You know, after seeing the halftime show, I am on the side of, I think it was good for him to get out there. But I do think his statements, as we've talked about, right, These kind of like milquetoast statements of love is more powerful than hate. Like, you know, there's only so far you could get with that.
- [25:31]
Brittany Luce
Listen. Oh, my gosh.
- [25:33]
Sponsor/Advertisement Voice
See?
- [25:33]
Brittany Luce
David, Alana, Rihanna, this was a dream conversation. Thank you all so much for staying up and talking with me about all things Bad Bunny. I really appreciate it.
- [25:42]
Alana Casanova Burgess
Thanks for having us.
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Stephen Thompson
Thank you, Brittany.
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Alana Casanova Burgess
I'm on the west coast, so I got a whole night ahead of me.
- [25:47]
Brittany Luce
Oh, my God. So you could like hit the club after this. I had to leave a party and I'm like, and you. And you'll be able to go, I.
- [25:53]
Stephen Thompson
I DVR the game. I'm going to go watch Seattle finish crushing the Patriots.
- [25:58]
Rihanna Cruz
I couldn't.
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Brittany Luce
Do we know who want or do you want? Do you not want to?
- [26:01]
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No.
- [26:01]
Stephen Thompson
I just got the news alert a second ago and it's like Seattle smothers New England.
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Brittany Luce
Oh, good.
- [26:05]
Stephen Thompson
Oh, my gosh.
- [26:06]
Brittany Luce
That's gonna put me in a good mood. That was Stephen Thompson, co host of NPR's Pop Culture Happy Hour, music and entertainment critic Brianna Cruz, and Alana Casanova Burgess, host of La Brega Podcast from Futuro Studios, which has a brand new season out. And I am Brittany Luce, host of NPR's It's Been a Minute.
- [26:25]
Stephen Thompson
This episode was produced by Liz Metzger, Cory, Antonio Rose and Mike Katsif. The showrunner for Pop Culture Happy Hour is Jessica Reedy, and the showrunner for It's Been a Minute is Barton Girdwood. Hello. Come in. Provides pop culture happy hours theme music. Thank you for listening. I'm Stephen Thompson and we will see you all next time.
- [26:46]
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- [27:17]
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