This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Andrew Athias, 33, a Philadelphia-based digital marketer and content creator. It has been edited for length and clarity.
I was one of the 500 bunches of dancing grass at Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl halftime show. I got paid $18.70 per hour for the gig, but I would’ve done it for free.
I’m a big Bad Bunny fan. I’ve been to three of his concerts since my girlfriend introduced me to him in 2021.
I found the grass gig through a company called Backlit, which handles finding extras for the halftime show. I found it last year when I saw Kendrick Lamar at the Super Bowl halftime show, but I forgot about it until Bad Bunny was announced as Super Bowl’s headliner in October, and I decided to apply.
I was one of the few crazy people to fly over from the East Coast to be part of the field cast. I flew out to San Francisco from Philadelphia in the middle of a snowstorm and have been out here for two weeks, rehearsing for the big day, and it has been worth it.
Job description: Be athletic
The requirements for the role were pretty basic. You had to be no taller than six feet, no shorter than five feet seven inches, and of an athletic build.
The listing said we had to be able to wear a 40-plus-pound costume and to be comfortable dancing in proximity with other performers for long periods. Other than that, we had to measure every part of our body from head to toe, elbow to floor, shoulder to clavicle, etc. Those were the only requirements.
They didn’t tell us we’d be wearing a grass costume and kept it super vague.
12-hour rehearsals with a 40-pound grass costume
My part was actually really easy. They just told me where to stand, and they said, “Don’t move. Stand here and be one with the grass.”
The suits were heavy and uncomfortable. Every now and again, you’ll have a blade of plastic grass going places where grass should not go. Fortunately, we were given some protective goggles.
There were definitely times when we were wearing the suits for about six or seven hours because they had to make alterations. There were about eight practices in total, with the last three lasting 12 hours each.
But the production crew did their best to make this suit as wearable as possible; they listened to every complaint and tried to fix it.
And getting to see behind the scenes of the production was a treat.
It was really cool to see Bad Bunny perform just a foot away. But because he was in LA for the Grammys during some of our rehearsals, the crew had a Bad Bunny stand-in they called “Good Rabbit.”
An electrifying atmosphere
Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for Roc Nation
One of the other things they asked for in the application was whether you had marching band experience or experience in the entertainment industry. I was in a collegiate a capella group, so I’m not scared of performing in front of big crowds.
But it’s definitely different when you have a stadium full of people vibing, moving, grooving to Bad Buddy’s music.
I spent about $2,600 on flights, hotels, and a rental car for the two weeks. I’m a content creator without a full time job now, so I didn’t have to take any paid time off for this.
The hardest part of the gig was keeping quiet
The hardest part of the whole thing wasn’t the long hours or the heavy costume, but rather keeping quiet about it. They made us sign an NDA to not talk about it or post anything on social media for two weeks.
So when I saw people posting about what his setlist was going to be, it was so hard to have so much knowledge and power and not be able to do anything with it.
I told only a very small handful of people that I was going to San Francisco and would be involved in the half-time show.
I didn’t tell them what I was dressed as. I didn’t tell them where to look for me on the field. All I said was, “You’re going to see me. You just didn’t know that you saw me.”
