LA Super Bowl was a Hollywood cliche of rags and riches, cheek by jowl

The event showed just how much the city hasn't changed, in which staggering wealth and abject poverty coexist without really touching, like oil and vinegar

Before the Super Bowl could officially kick off in Los Angeles, someone had to raise the curtain on this distinctly post-Covid festival of American glitz and glamour - so why not the biggest movie star on the planet.

In a WWE-style teaser that played over the enormous video board that hovers over SoFi Stadium like a serpentine halo, the Rock set the tone for Super Gold Sunday, TV-speak for the cosmic-like coincidence of a Super Bowl falling during the middle weekend of the Winter Olympics - a first. Over the course of a two-minute monologue the actor-wrestler also known as Dwayne Johnson valorized the gladiators here as well as the others gritting it out under our flag in the Beijing Olympics. And he made sure to justify why we should stay tuned to the exception of all else. It's about the idea that this game [the Super Bowl] and these Games [the Olympics] can achieve one of the most precious feats of all - bringing us all together for a celebration of who we are."