Rihanna wasn’t kidding when she teased she was “thinking about bringing someone” with her during her Super Bowl Halftime Show performance. Rih, 34, kicked off her performance by rubbing her belly as the drone camera flew away, leaving some to ask, “is she pregnant?” It seems not even those who worked with her on that spectacular knew for sure, as TMZ reports that her pregnancy was “a well-kept secret even among people who were part of the show,” a secret she managed to keep “due in part to the baggy clothing she’d been rocking during all the rehearsals.”
The “upwards of 280” backup dancers were also in the dark about the bun in Rihanna’s oven. They reportedly didn’t know she was pregnant, mostly due to the “loose-fitting outfits” she wore to practice on Saturday and Sunday. Most on-field dancers may not have gotten close enough to see anything, considering Rihanna started her show suspended high above the field. TMZ also noted that when Rihanna and A$AP Rocky attended the Golden Globes in January, she also wore a black gown that hid her stomach. The ruching detail down the front would have hidden any kind of bump.
Rihanna and Rocky, 34, welcomed their first child in May 2022, a son whose name has yet to be revealed. Since then, Rocky and Rihanna’s relationship has gone strong, presumably to where her unborn child is his. Rocky was also on-hand at Super Bowl LVII to watch Rihanna perform, and afterward, the couple – with their nearly 1-year-old son – was photographed leaving the State Farm Stadium together.
During the pre-Super Bowl press conference, Rihanna revealed that her son was partially why she took on the Halftime gig. “When you become a mom, there is something that just happens where you feel like you can take on the world,” she said, per CNN. “The Super Bowl is one of the big stages in the world, so as scary as that was – because I haven’t been on stage in seven years – there’s something exhilarating about the challenge of it all,” said Rihanna, who last toured in 2016. “It’s important for me to do this this year. It’s important for representation. It’s important for my son to see that.”
“I’ve been so focused on the Super Bowl, I totally forgot my birthday is coming up,” she also said (February 20, btw). “I totally forgot about Valentine’s Day. I am just like, ‘Super Bowl, Super Bowl, Super Bowl.’ So, it’s a lot of preparation, a lot of moving parts, and this week, this is the week that it really is being tested.