M.I.A. flipped off crowd
SINGER M.I.A. APPEARED TO FLIP OFF THE CROWD DURING HALFTIME. Associated Press
INDIANAPOLIS – For all the pomp and excess of Madonna’s Super Bowl halftime extravaganza a single extended middle finger by guest singer M.I.A. is likely to be the most remembered piece of the show. The gesture, accompanied by a barely disguised expletive, came during a performance of Madonna’s new single, “Give Me All Your Luvin.”
At the end of her lines, M.I.A. appeared to sing “I don’t give a (expletive),” although it was hard to hear clearly. The incident was reminiscent of Janet Jackson’s infamous “wardrobe malfunction” eight years ago — a surprise risque moment in front of tens of millions of unsuspecting viewers.
The brief exposure of Jackson’s nipple during the 2004 halftime show raised a storm of controversy and put CBS in hot water with the Federal Communications Commission. The Super Bowl, shown on NBC this year, is routinely viewed by more than 100 million people, the biggest TV event of the year.
“We apologize for the inappropriate gesture that aired during halftime,” NBC spokesman Christopher McCloskey said. “It was a spontaneous gesture that our delay system caught late.” The screen briefly went blurred after M.I.A.’s gesture in what was a late attempt — by less than a second — to cut out the camera shot.
The NFL, which produces the show, blamed a failure in NBC’s delay system for allowing the gesture to be seen. Spokesman Brian McCarthy said M.I.A. did not do anything similar during rehearsals and the league had no reason to believe she would pull something like that during the actual show.
“The obscene gesture in the performance was completely inappropriate, very disappointing, and we apologize to our fans,” McCarthy said. The British singer M.I.A. is best known for her 2007 hit “Paper Planes,” a Grammy nominee for record of the year that memorably features a sample of the Clash song, “Straight to Hell.” It was featured on the soundtrack to the movie “Slumdog Millionaire.”
Madonna had admittedly been nervous about her performance, hoping to position herself as the queen of a new generation of pop stars with an opulent show and a sharp performance that mixed her new release with more familiar songs. She seemed like Roman royalty when muscle-bound men carried her extravagant throne across the football field to the stage for her opening song, “Vogue.”
Guests Cee Lo, Nicki Minaj and dance rockers LMFAO also appeared with Madonna. The singing and dancing on “Vogue” was smartly choreographed, as Madonna moved more deliberately — she is 53 — but still adroitly. She briefly appeared to stumble at one point while trying to make a step on the stage set, but recovered in time.
She let a tightrope walker make the more acrobatic moves during a performance of “Music.” Madonna carried gold pompons for a performance of her new single. Twitter was alight with questions about the vocals being lip synched or augmented by tapes, particularly during this song.
The best guest was clearly Cee Lo, who joined Madonna for the final song, “Like a Prayer.” They were joined by a robed chorus in the show’s most soaring performance. With a puff of white smoke, Madonna disappeared down a trap door in the stage, and lights on the field spelled out “World Peace.”
The performance was also carried live on SiriusXM Radio, giving Madonna the biggest single audience of her career. For all the elaborate choreography and flashy effects, the finger incident is the more likely headline from the event.
Earlier, Kelly Clarkson, Blake Shelton and Miranda Lambert offered some pregame patriotism. Shelton and Lambert did a twangy duet on “America the Beautiful” and Clarkson, in a simple black dress, sang “The Star Spangled Banner” without a hitch after last year’s performer, Christina Aguilera, flubbed a line.
February 5th, 2012 at 10:37 pm
Geez! A finger? You’re watching an event where grown men knock each other down. I didn’t even notice the middle finger thing. I thought the halftime show was well done. We were all thinking the same thing, that Madonna would do something shock-worthy. But she has class at 53. It was diffcult to tell if she was lip-syncing likely due to the time-delay in the event of a wardrobe malfunction. I know of MIA’s hit song from “Slumdog Millionaire” but had no idea that was her on stage. Who cares? Hopefully this story won’t be in the headlines for years like the Janet Jackson thing.
February 5th, 2012 at 10:46 pm
if that stupid clown eurotrash black trick doesnt like the USA she can stop selling her records here and make a statement that way
February 5th, 2012 at 10:56 pm
this is what happens when they invite artists that people forgot about to do the SB halftime show. Publicity stunt. She got what she wanted.
February 5th, 2012 at 11:06 pm
Thumbs up for M.I.A
-Interesting moment during the show, trying to uncensore it made it worse
Superbowl 46: Was the patriots to loose going into the 4th quarter
Sidenote: shouldve went for 2 hailmary’s at the end instead of the one last play
Double thumbs up for the asian that took a picture of him kissing the lombardi trophy
February 5th, 2012 at 11:10 pm
MIA is classless. she picked a moment when she knew 100 millon americans would be watching and flipped us all off .. send her back to the UK in a box with her mic stuffed up her @$$
February 5th, 2012 at 11:14 pm
I think the best part is that she flipped the middle finger, yet we don’t know why. Was she flipping off America? Was it apart of her lyrics? Bash her all you want but you really don’t know why she did it. She could have been doing it for personal reasons. Maybe saying you forgot me, now you’ll remember me.
February 5th, 2012 at 11:22 pm
everybody needs to put their kids to sleep… they shouldnt be watching madonna flipping around with her panties in the first place!!
February 5th, 2012 at 11:28 pm
even know who she was…i was like hey madonna, hey Nicki, hey Ceelo…who the ? i saw the censor but was the most forgettable to me…Madonna and them did the damn thang…best show in a looong time.