How Up with People paved a Super Bowl path for Bad Bunny - ESPN

THE LAST SUPER BOWL halftime show for Up with People featured a dizzying array of pastel clothes, tinsel tambourines and perpetual smiles. The group cut loose with a daring Bruce Springsteen/Huey Lewis/Stevie Wonder/Kenny Loggins cover medley.

Jill Johnson has no regrets. She was young and far away from her home in Mallard, Iowa, and its sign that reads «We're Friendly Ducks.» It was the 1980s.

Collar stretched high and blazer sleeves rolled up, Johnson tickled the synthesizer keys with one hand and danced to the high-octane techno song «Talkin' With My Feet.» Her impossibly large (and potentially hazardous) earrings bounced along to the beat.

«I've got a tingle down in my shoes.

A crazy itch that I just can't lose ...»

OK, so it wasn't Beyoncé, or Prince doing «Purple Rain» in a downpour.

Up with People never claimed to be rock stars. Or professionals. It was a song-and-dance ensemble made up mostly of college students that traveled the world promoting multiculturalism and positivity. There were about 600 of them in the Superdome in New Orleans that night at Super Bowl XX.

The NFL spent $1 million for the first time on the 1986 show, called «Beat of the Future,» which included a futuristic floating city and planets hovering overhead. A planet caught fire the night before and the city never really materialized because of technical difficulties. Still, the group managed an enthusiastic 12-minute pitch for love, acceptance and worldwide harmony.

Jim Steeg, a longtime NFL exec who was in charge of halftime entertainment from 1979 to 2005, remembers making his way up to commissioner Pete Rozelle's box after the performance.

«He turned to me,» Steeg says of Rozelle, «and said, 'Never f---ing again.»

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