Behind The Scenes At The Super Bowl Halftime Show; Why Performers Aren't Paid

Super Bowl XLVII halftime performer Beyonce "won't be making a dime from the NFL," according to Victor Luckerson of TIME magazine. The NFL since Super Bowl I has "not paid performers an appearance fee." The Who frontman Roger Daltrey, whose band performed at Super Bowl XLIV in '10, said that the event is "an opportunity for increased exposure, even for a band that’s already sold 100 million records." Madonna’s halftime show last year "actually garnered more viewers than the game itself, making it the most-watched event in television history." From the NFL’s perspective, "such publicity is payment enough." NFL Programming Dir Lawrence Randall said, "We’re putting someone up there for twelve and a half minutes in front of the largest audience that any television program garners in the United States. It’s a pretty good deal. It’s the famous win-win for both parties." Nielsen data shows that digital purchases of The Who's music "quadrupled the week after its Super Bowl performance," and physical albums also "saw a large spike in sales." Performing at the Super Bowl "acts as a type of affirmation of an artist’s pop-culture ubiquity" (TIME.com, 1/31).

SASHA FIERCE: Beyonce came under fire after admitting she did not perform the national anthem live at President Obama's inauguration, but on Thursday she said that she "won't be lip-syncing" during her Super Bowl performance. Beyonce: "I will absolutely be singing live. I am well-rehearsed and I will absolutely be singing live. This is what I was born to do, what I was born for" (WASHINGTONPOST.com, 1/31). USA TODAY's Elysa Gardner wrote it is "unlikely that we'll hear the term 'wardrobe malfunction' around the water cooler Monday." Nor should there be "questionable words or gestures, such as the middle finger seen round the world last February -- raised by MIA." Rolling Stone Associate Editor Andy Greene said he expects the production value of Beyonce's performance to be "a spectacular (show) on par with something from Broadway or Vegas" (USA TODAY, 2/1). Beyonce said of the set design, "It took so many months to just decide what the stage was because some of the things that were in my head just weren't possible to put together in that amount of time." She said choosing which songs to perform "was one of the hardest things" (NFL Network, 1/31). Rolling Stone Associate Editor Simon Vozick-Levinson said what Beyonce “needs to do at the Super Bowl on Sunday is go out there and give the performance we all know she can ... and I think she definitely will” (“Nightline,” ABC, 2/1).