Supertime

While attending a dinner party about twenty years ago I appalled an acquaintance by stating that baseball meant more to me than religion. Well, he has long retreated to that Great Bullpen in the Sky, or, as I deem more likely, is reconstituted as disassociated organic molecules. Meanwhile I am Left Behind on Earth to observe how, at least, during this week, football means more to the Nation, even the Red State Nation, than does religion. The week prior to Super Bowl has been codified into a quasi Holy Week, with its own set of rituals (it's "Meet the Press" Day!) to engage the media and the public.

Super Bowl Sunday has unquestionably become an important cultural and economic event, with all the holiday trappings short of gifts and Hallmark cards. Traffic subsides (it's Sunday anyway); friends gather; Las Vegas swells with visitors; TV Guide publishes its annual Super Bowl recipes; the network broadcasting the game (usually Fox) floods the airwaves with promotions for its shows. Truly, if an alien wanted to take a snapshot of our society, this would be the day to do it.

Like everyone else, I have my share of personal Super Bowl memories. There was the curiosity of the first game, in 1967, when we wondered if the AFL upstarts from Kansas City would be physically able to contain the Packers from the kickoff on, as though they were a Pop Warner team grotesquely promoted as sacrificial opponents. Then there was the Jets miracle victory in 1969, an annus mirabulus for Shea Stadium denizens. And I'll always remember Whitney Houston's startling rendition, even prerecorded, of the National Anthem in 1991. But my favorite memory came in the early '80s, when I attended a Super Bowl party in West Los Angeles to watch the 49ers face the Bengals. At half-time several of us left for a stroll and found ourselves wandering onto the nearby Mormon chapel and high ground. The landscaping was Heaven-like, with no view of surrounding terrestrial buildings, and celestial choirs piping out of invisible speakers. Suddenly an elder appeared and, as is his wont, invited us on a tour of the building. We politely abstained, apologetically admitting that we stopped by only because it was half-time in this football game we were watching. "Yes," the elder nodded with a smile, "The Bengals are sure giving them a game!" And, for a sublime moment, I felt quite edified that a sporting event could unite such disparate characters.

In 1984, I believe, came a transforming moment, when Apple's "1984"-type ad not only jumpstarted its director Ridley Scott's career, but set a standard for high-end commercials that would gain huge exposure to the captive audience, or at least those with cooperative bladders. In the next fifteen years the show became more a marketing tool than anything else. Though the frenzy has died down a bit (even if the ad rates have not), the Super Bowl is still the only TV event in for which the commercials are studied and evaluated and best-yet, watched.

Last year I was so fixated on the commercials that, like millions of others, I held my water through most of the first half, fighting my tendency to mute or wink out during the commercials, and saved my departure for the half-time ceremonies. Bad move, for I ended up missing the great Wardrobe Malfunction that so set the moral hypocrites of our nation on edge and launched a thousand FCC fines. Actually, I returned to the game just in time to see a flasher streak across the screen for a brief moment, an event that seems to have been lost in history owing to Janet Jackson's starry nipple. Of course I got to watch the replays ad infinitum, and frankly, I thought the dance Justin Timberlake did with Jackson, culminating in that two-second partial disrobing, was pretty erotic. Even titillating.

But how dare the NFL, CBS, and anyone ever voting Democrat allow such a desecration of such a sacred sport as football by associating it, even obliquely, with women's breasts? Think of how offensive this must have been to the Bosom twins in the Bud Lite ads, not to mention all the females cheerleaders who've ever existed, whose appeal, of course, has been solely to the moral and intellectual advancement of the spectators.

Okay, I'm being just a bit ironic, but I think the Janet Jackson incident does give us some unhappy insight into the contradictions of our society. A follow-up incident later last year, when a pre-game promo featuring "Desperate Housewives" actor Nicolette Sheridan baring her boobs to Terrell Owens caused almost as big a brouhaha. Interestingly, the spot was supposed to feature John Madden, which would have made the hint of extracurricular play with the nymph rather funny. But when the gladiatorial Owens dropped his helmet and started making moves, jaws dropped. That suggested real animal sex, and probably more fun to watch than the game. This scenario proved too troubling to Red State Nation. Sport and sex are made to complement each other, I suppose, but not to mix. Hang the evildoer perpetrators! That's what happens in a parochial culture when conflicting hypocrisies collide. Very sad.

So the Game has moved from a curiosity to a marketing phenomenon to another battleground of the Culture Wars. And nobody seems to give a damn about the game itself, which actually has been very competitive in recent years, often going down to the last second. Who won last year? Okay, not too hard, the Patriots. But the year before that? Anyone? It was Tampa Bay. Who did they beat? Who cares? Oh look, Paul McCartney's doing the half-time show. How weird that he's really turning 64. Please pass the guacamole.