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Monday, February 06, 2012

A Great Day For Entertainment



I watched the Super Bowl.
More correctly, I had it on as background, and I did watch a number of plays in the first half when I looked up from the laptop, and I was impressed by a number of things. I had no intention of seeing the thing through: I wanted to see the half-time show.

I do not think I have ever seen a Super Bowl half-time show... ever. I have no memory of it. Perhaps I was drunk at sometime in the past, and I watched the spectacle, but collapsed into a alcoholic black-out and woke up with AMNESIA  (another great soap opera story-line from last night that was recorded and which I am watching this morning: Downton Abbey!).
Anyway, She-who-must-be-obeyed always watches the half-time spectacle, often surfing between it and The Puppy Bowl on the Animal Planet channel, and I thought we could share a fond memory or two.

The Madonna show was preceded by three talking heads who gave one of the breathless, thrilling, and pumped about Half Number I, Quarters I and II to be exact, soon to be followed by Quarters III and IV. They started out  by imagining what some coach might be saying to some team in some locker room right about now, and surprisingly enough it had to do with not playing up to one's potential.

Then came Madonna.
I was absolutely appalled. There seemed to be no theme, starting out as Rome and Cleopatra - Hail Caesar! We who are about to overwhelm you with dreck, salute you! - and switching into Vogue Magazine, an obvious connection and metaphor to some in the football world, but certainly not to me. Then it went somewhere else, but I had amnesia again.
I did not like the choreography, which I thought to be wooden and uninspired; Madonna herself was no Ann Miller who could energetically "hoof it" into her 50's and beyond; the songs were nothing to speak of, and the pyrotechnics and light show were lame.

Just as I had given up and was going to bed - I go to bed early, but I get up very early, too - I told my wife that the show stunk, and I looked back at the screen one last time.
I said, "Did that girl just throw me the finger?!"
She laughed, "She probably did."
This morning I discover that indeed she had digitized me. If I were her, I would not have messed with Madonna.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Couldn't agree more about the hype and the half-time. It was truly terrible! But the game . . . well, that was pretty good.

Montag said...

Yes. I have been thinking a lot about Sports lately, and how "artful" it is.

The main thing I dislike about Sports is sports hype, sports writing, and sports commentators.