ENTERTAINMENT
February 4, 2014 | By Mikael Wood
As our regular readers might recall, Pop & Hiss didn't especially enjoy Red Hot Chili Peppers' appearance Sunday night during the otherwise-delightful Super Bowl halftime show by Bruno Mars. Did our distaste for the band's rendition of "Give It Away" have anything to do with the fact that Flea appeared to be playing a bass that wasn't plugged in, as a number of keen-eyed observers pointed out following the performance? It did not. Before it's a concert, the Super Bowl halftime show is -- like the football game that surrounds it -- a full-tilt TV spectacle, one far more dependent on energy and charisma and visual style than on whether actual instruments are being actually played before our eyes and ears.
ENTERTAINMENT
February 3, 2014 | By Mary McNamara
Peyton Manning choked, Bruno Mars shone, Jerry Seinfeld droned and Joe Theismann showed up in the post-game episode of "Brooklyn Nine-Nine. " Where he broke his leg. Again. Where once TV's biggest live event dominated four or five hours of Sunday television, it now claims weeks. Forget the sports-page buildup, the commercials now have their own teaser ads, the half-time show inevitably has "something to prove" (beyond how very old the members of the Who have become), and the follow-up shows go out of their way to leverage the premium spot.
NEWS
February 3, 2014 | By Susan Denley
Bruno Mars and his band wore Saint Laurent in their Super Bowl halftime show. Racked toted up the numbers and concluded that Mars' outfit would cost $5,830 (if one paid for it oneself). [Racked] In an interview with W magazine, Miley Cyrus says her image is calculated and that she wants to encourage girls to go for personal style. "Everyone to me looks like Vanna White," she says. She also says her rustic childhood may have something to do with the crop tops and other body-baring outfits she wears now: “We never were inside, and we never wore shoes, I think it's why I like wearing no clothes so much and I'm always naked.” [W]
ENTERTAINMENT
February 3, 2014 | By Mikael Wood
The question dominated much of the nonfootball-related chatter in the run-up to Sunday's Super Bowl: As the featured act of this year's halftime show, was Bruno Mars really up to the job of entertaining a television audience of approximately 100 million people? The answer, it turned out, was yes. But before he could prove it, Mars had to weather a storm of skepticism. He's only 28, decades younger than other artists who've played the show recently, such as Prince and the Rolling Stones.
SPORTS
January 29, 2014 | Chris Erskine
On the phone, history-making NFL figure Carol Channing. You mean you didn't know she was the first Super Bowl halftime star? Before her 1970 appearance, Super Bowls had featured only marching bands. Then Channing came marching in, and the game's halftimes would never be the same. In fact, Super Bowl halftime is now considered the most-watched entertainment event in the world. She turns 93 on Friday and doesn't hear well. Over the phone, my questions about her pioneering performance in New Orleans get bantered back and forth like fumbles on a frosty field, her assistant trying to help, her publicist graciously stepping in, me trying to make sense of it all in my usual ham-handed way. Wish I had a recording.
SPORTS
January 28, 2014 | By Mike James
OK, for those of you who have Super Bowl parties scheduled, or for those who tune in to the NFL once a year and for some reason don't know, Super Bowl XLVIII is scheduled to begin at 6:30 p.m. Sunday in East Rutherford, N.J.. That's 3:30 p.m. PST. If you want to plan some kind of activity during halftime instead of watching Bruno Mars and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, figure on getting a break in the game about 90 minutes after the start. You'll have plenty of time; some halftime extravaganzas seem to last forever, but the break will probably be about half an hour.