Jennifer Lopez is facing backlash after revealing she was unhappy about sharing the stage at Super Bowl 2020 with fellow star Shakira.
The duo took the stage by storm at the iconic annual halftime show, earning praise from fans and celebrities worldwide for their history-making performance.
Shakira opened the show with a live performance of her 2009 hit “She Wolf” before performing a string of her chart-topping hits including “Hips Do not Lie” and “Waka Waka.”
In the second half of the show, J.Lo got the crowd going with a string of her biggest hits, including “Jenny From the Block,” “On the Floor” and her closing hit “Let us Get Loud,” on which she was backed by Shakira.
But despite the obvious success of the joint performance, J.Lo was not too pleased with the NFL’s decision to send her and Shakira on stage together. In her upcoming Netflix documentary “Halftime,” she admitted that she thought it was “the worst idea in the world.”
As the name suggests, Halftime focuses on Jennifer’s performance at the 2020 Super Bowl and gives viewers plenty of insider information about what it was like behind the scenes leading up to the show.
We have now learned that Jennifer was frustrated with the organizers of the Halftime show for allowing her and Shakira the same amount of time that any other solo artist would have gotten, instead of doubling it.
By comparison, artists usually get 12 to 16 minutes on stage during the halftime show. Previous solo artists like The Weeknd and Beyoncé have used this time to move from one song to the next in a medley style, resulting in an eye-catching compilation of their greatest hits.
But it’s also not uncommon for multiple artists to share the stage for a performance of this length. At the last Super Bowl, for example, stars Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Eminem, Mary J. Blige, Kendrick Lamar and 50 Cent performed together, with each member having only a few minutes.
J.Lo, however, was clearly unhappy with the idea of her and Shakira splitting the time between them, telling her music director Kim Burse in her Netflix documentary, “We got six fucking minutes. We have 30 seconds for a song, and if we take a minute, we only have five. But there have to be certain songs that we sing. We have to have our singing moments.”
“It’s not going to be a damn dance revue. We have to sing our message,” she said, before calling the whole thing “the worst idea in the world.”
“It’s the worst idea in the world to have two people do the Super Bowl. It was the worst idea in the world,” she said.
The documentary also showed Jennifer and Shakira discussing how they were going to split their time. “They said 12 minutes. I got confirmation that we could have a minute or two more, so now we are at 13, 14 minutes. I think, Shakira, we should reserve half the time for you and half for me,” Jen said.
“If it was going to be a double headliner, they should have given us 20 minutes,” she added. “They damn well should have.”
Jen’s manager, Benny Medina, also spoke out against the NFL’s decision, calling it “an insult.” “Normally at the Super Bowl, you have a headliner,” he said. “That headliner designs the show, and if they want to have other guests, that’s their decision. It was an insult to say you need two Latinas to do the job that one artist has done in the past.”
Shortly after Jennifer’s comments surfaced online, fans railed against her “entitled” stance, arguing that regardless of the time constraints, she and Shakira were still able to put on a pretty iconic show.
And fans were soon reminded of the marked difference between Jennifer’s and Shakira’s promotions for the Super Bowl in the lead-up to their performance.