Taylor Swift isn’t about to mix business with pleasure.
Last month, the NFL announced that Bad Bunny will headline the Super Bowl 60 halftime show in February, ending rampant speculation that Swift, who is engaged to Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, would perform.
The “Fate of Ophelia” singer says her camp spoke with Jay-Z and his company, Roc Nation, which produces the Super Bowl halftime shows, and let him know where she stood on the opportunity.
“Here’s the thing: Jay-Z has always been very good to me. Our teams are really close,” she said Oct. 6 on “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.”
“They sometimes will call and say, ‘How does she feel about (mumbles)?’And that’s not an official offer or a conference room conversation. Our teams are really close. How does she feel about it, in general? And we’re always able to tell him the truth, which is that I am in love with a guy who does that sport on that actual field.”
The Grammy winner then continued to explain how rough football can be, which influences the decisions she makes.
“That is violent chess. That is gladiators without swords. That is dangerous,” she said. “The whole season I am locked in on what that man (Kelce) is doing on the field.”
Swift tried to put into perspective how disjointed it would feel for her to try to plan a halftime show, knowing Kelce is putting his body through the ringer on the gridiron.
“Can you imagine if he’s out there every single week putting his life on the line, doing this very dangerous, very high-pressure, high-intensity sport, and I’m like, ‘I wonder what my choreo should be. I think we should do two verses of ‘Shake it Off’ into ‘Blank Space’ into ‘Cruel Summer’ would be great,’” she joked.
She also said the decision not to perform is hers and hers alone.
“This is nothing to do with Travis. He would love for me to do it. I’m just too locked in,” she said.
The chatter that Swift would perform at the halftime show only got louder when NFL commissioner Roger Goodell told TODAY during an appearance last month that Swift headlining the halftime show was “a maybe.”
“I’m waiting on my friend Jay-Z,” he added. “It’s in his hands. I’m waiting for the smoke to come out.”
Travis Kelce may have played in 4 Super Bowl games, but proposing to Taylor Swift still made him nervous.
The selection of Bad Bunny as halftime performer has been met with celebrations and some backlash too, prompting him to joke about it during his monologue while hosting the season premiere of “Saturday Night Live” on Oct. 4.
“You might not know this, but I’m doing the Super Bowl halftime show,” he said. “I’m very happy and I think everyone is happy about it. Even Fox News.”
Bad Bunny will hit the stage for the show when Super Bowl 60 takes place Feb. 8 at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California.
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