*When Rihanna takes the stage on Super Bowl Sunday (02-12-23), it’ll be her first bite at the apple after turning down the opportunity in 2019 because she was a supporter of embattled QB Colin Kaepernick who was effectively banned by the NFL for kneeling in protest police brutality.
“I just couldn’t be a sellout,” the entertainer told Vogue at the time. “I couldn’t be an enabler.”
Well, as the age-old saying goes, that was then. It’s a new day, so to speak and now RiRi is ready!
“I felt like it was now or never for me,” Rihanna said in an interview a few months ago. “The Super Bowl is one of the biggest stages in the world, it’s an entertainer’s dream to be on a stage like that.”
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Rihanna’s reality is that she won’t be the Apple Music halftime act because she’s looking for a payday in front of an estimated nearly 200 million viewers
As Forbes notes, the upcoming performance on Sunday marks “Rihanna’s return to music after nearly six years away. In October, she released her first single since 2017—’Lift Me Up’ from ‘Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,’ which earned her an Oscar nomination for Best Original Song. Not that the 34-year-old singer has been slacking off during her hiatus from music. In addition to giving birth to her first child in May, the 34-year-old has built Fenty Beauty—launched six years ago with luxury goods giant LVMH—into one of the most inclusive and successful cosmetics brands in the industry, worth an estimated $2.8 billion. In 2018, she also launched the lingerie brand Savage X Fenty, which was weighing a $3 billion IPO, following a $125 million funding round last year. Together the businesses make up the vast majority of Rihanna’s estimated $1.4 billion fortune.”
No, she’s not doing it for the money because there isn’t any. Rihanna, like other a-listers before her – Beyoncé, Bruno Mars, Justin Timberlake, Janet Jackson, Michael Jackson, Prince – won’t be paid for her Super Bowl performance as is custom for halftime headliners. Nope, no pay, but there are other huge benefits from the exposure to a massive audience.
Call it the halftime show effect. For instance, Forbes notes: “last year’s performance featured West Coast hip-hop starring legends Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Mary J. Blige, Kendrick Lamar, Eminem and 50 Cent, each of whom saw a boost to their personal catalogs. In the week after the Super Bowl, Dr. Dre saw a 183% increase in album sales and a 105% bump in on-demand streams, according to data from Luminate. Blige’s album sales jumped 999% during that time, and Snoop Dogg’s rose 361, Luminate said. And the production itself continued to earn accolades long after the big game ended: it was nominated for five Emmy awards and won three, including the trophy for Best Live Variety Special, the first time ever a Super Bowl halftime show had won that honor.”
Besides being every artist’s dream of performing in front of a worldwide audience for the sheer thrill of it, the Super Bowl Halftime performance is her chance to return to her music roots and reconnect with her audience after years away from the stage.
And like previous Super Bowl shows, it won’t come cheap. A representative for Rihanna declined to confirm whether she is putting her own money into the performance like Dr. Dre, who reportedly spen over $ 7 million of his own money to help pul;l off his show last year.
“I get involved with every aspect of anything that I do,” Rihanna said Thursday at a press conference ahead of the game. “Whether it’s the Super Bowl, whether it’s a makeup product, whether it’s Savage lingerie…I want to see the copy on the website. I want to name every lipstick that I make,” the CEO said. “If it flops or it flies, my name has to stand by that.”
You can bet your bottom dollar that Fenty Beauty and Savage X Fenty will also be featured front and center in Sunday’s spectacle especially since it comes days before Valentine’s Day, a historically busy time for the lingerie industry. The Forbes article also mentions that both brands have launched a limited edition “game day” line, featuring football-themed sweats, shirts reading, “Rihanna concert interrupted by a football game, weird but whatever,” lipsticks, and even a ball-shaped makeup sponge.
“The Fenty highlighter is definitely helping today,” Rihanna cracked at Thursday’s press conference as she took a break from rehearsals. “Because I have yet to sleep.”
But what’s really on Rihanna’s mind she says is using Super Bowl LVII to put the spotlight on her music.
“This show is gonna be a celebration of my catalog, the best way we can put it together,” she said ahead of the performance. “You’re trying to cram 17 years of work into 13 minutes.”
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