Even before Rihanna set foot on stage for her Super Bowl halftime performance, #FentyBowl trended on Twitter, signaling a growing anticipation for her long-awaited return to music and her first time gracing a stage since January 2018. The camera panned over her face, her full-length red jumpsuit and her hands lightly cradling her belly. She began her set with “B—- Better Have My Money,” an anthem that implores us all to demand what we’re worth before transitioning into a slew of hits, backed by an electrified band and dancers moving in lockstep, wearing custom outfits from her own lingerie and athleisure line.
Rihanna chose to helm the stage solo. It feels safe to assume that wasn’t coincidental.
The halftime show wasn’t only a spotlight for Rihanna’s innate ability to captivate a crowd more than seven years after releasing her last album. It was also a statement: As that jumpsuit draped across her visibly pregnant belly, Rihanna embodied the notion that working mothers can still command the spotlight while retaining their sexiness and sexuality and asserting their agency. (After the performance, Rihanna’s representation confirmed that she is pregnant with her second child. She birthed her first child with A$AP Rocky in May 2022.) It’s no wonder, then, that one of her opening lyrics was “Who y’all think y’all frontin’ on?”
While many Super Bowl halftime performers share the stage with other artists — like Dr. Dre’s star-studded 2022 performance — Rihanna chose to helm the stage solo. It feels safe to assume that wasn’t coincidental. She could’ve asked Jay-Z to perform “Run This Town” or asked Drake to spit his verse on “Work,” but inviting other artists would’ve belied the point. Rihanna inherently understood the magnitude of the moment.
She’s more than a decade into a career where she’s crisscrossed musical genres, topped multiple Billboard charts, left music nearly altogether to conquer the beauty and fashion worlds, and is still capable of performing a halftime show without a new album to promote. She’s unstoppable. Becoming a mother has made her even more so. Even without new music to perform and a visibly different body, Rihanna honored her stacked discography, running through some of her most beloved hits while executing flawless choreography and moving every element of her body — including her belly. Technically, her stomach was hidden, but she wasn’t hiding her pregnancy. She was embracing it, moving with the music and still exuding the sex appeal she’s long been known for.
Sure, Rihanna moved her body less during this performance than she normally does, but we must remember that she’s anchoring a 13-minute set while carrying a fetus, at times suspended above the stadium crowd on a floating stage. It’s nothing less than a feat, no less powerful and mind-blowing than Serena Williams winning the 2017 Australian Open while pregnant.
We are aware of what pregnancy does to a body: There’s a host of symptoms including nausea, swelling and sometimes overall discomfort. Your uterus is growing, which can put pressure on your bladder and cause frequent urination. And yet, Rihanna tackled one of the biggest challenges of her career — and she used her children as both inspiration and motivation.
The NFL approached Rihanna about the halftime show when she was three-months postpartum with her first child, so she was hesitant about accepting, she said in a pre-show interview. But, as she told Apple News, “When you become a mom, there’s just something that just happens where you feel like you can take on the world, you can do anything, and the Super Bowl is one of the biggest stages in the world.” In a world that tells moms that they’re no longer valuable outside the home once they’ve given birth, Rihanna’s decision to become the first pregnant woman to helm the Super Bowl halftime show is a reminder that people giving birth aren’t just vessels for new life. They have passions and goals and desires that deserve to be honored, as Rihanna’s were. As she moved her pregnant body, looking directly at the camera, let’s hope it nudged us toward a cultural shift to a world that doesn’t diminish moms but rather encourages them to shine brightly outside of child-rearing. Let’s hope it nudged us toward a cultural shift to a world that doesn’t diminish moms but rather encourages them to shine brightly outside of child-rearing. Let’s not forget that Rihanna declined the NFL’s offer to headline the halftime show in 2019 because of the league’s treatment of quarterback Colin Kaepernick. At the time, she said she didn’t want to be a “sellout” and an “enabler.” It seems then that if she was going to change her mind, especially at this phase of her career, then it would need to be on her terms. What better time is there than right now? “It was important for me to do this this year. It’s important for representation,” she said after the performance. “It’s important for my son to see that.” If this were 2003, it might have been impossible for Rihanna to conceal her pregnancy until her performance. But she’s the pinnacle of celebrity in a time when those of her status are able to control their relationship with their art and with the public. She’s able to share what she wants to share when she wants to share it. It’s telling that we know nothing about Rihanna and A$AP Rocky’s first child. We know he’s been born, but his name has been withheld. We know she’s enjoying motherhood, but we don’t know much else. She’s guarded her child’s privacy effectively, and nothing leaks unless she desires it to. There’s power in that, in choosing her own destiny and making the decisions that best suit her, regardless of what’s happening in her uterus. At the end of the performance, as Rihanna sang a gorgeous rendition of “Diamonds,” the camera panned to show all the lights pointed in her direction as she hovered above the crowd and fireworks emitted in the background. It is as clear as it has ever been that Rihanna, pregnant once again and making history, remains one of our culture’s brightest diamonds, shining effortlessly forever more — and forever on her own terms.
