The Weeknd is just days away from one of the biggest moments of his career: the Super Bowl halftime show. In a recent Billboard feature, it was revealed that he is throwing a lot of money at the performance, as he has invested $7 million of his own dollars to put on the best show possible.
Wassim “Sal” Slaiby, The Weeknd’s manager and founder/CEO of management company SALXCO, noted that while Super Bowl organizers cover production costs, The Weeknd put up $7 million of his own money in order to “make this halftime show be what he envisioned.”
Amir “Cash” Esmailian — one of The Weeknd’s managers who also runs his own management company, YCFU — also noted, “We always had the Super Bowl on our bucket list, and we’ve always had timelines for all of our goals. It came a few years earlier than we expected.” The Weeknd added, “We’ve been really focusing on dialing in on the fans at home and making performances a cinematic experience, and we want to do that with the Super Bowl.”
In recent days, there have been reports that The Weeknd’s halftime show would run for about 24 minutes, which would be twice as long as the typical Super Bowl performance. However, those rumors were debunked, a a Pepsi publicist noted, “The Pepsi Super Bowl LV Halftime Show featuring The Weeknd will be roughly 12 to 13 minutes in length, as it has always been.”
Read the full feature here.
