Dressed in a red Versace semblance of a cardinal robe while walking arm in arm with a man dressed as the pope is certainly one way to make an entrance. Come to find out, it was all part of a plot to introduce her song, “Roman Holiday,” to the audience.
Assuming the form of her rage-induced alter ego, Roman Zolanski, Nicki's performance involved a mock exorcism on stage. In a later interview with Ryan Seacrest, Nicki briefly justified her vision.
“The religious figure is there because he was called on by Roman’s mom to rehabilitate him. I had this vision for him to be sort of exorcised — or, actually, he never gets exorcised — but people around him tell him he’s not good enough because he’s not normal, he’s not blending in with the average Joe. And so his mother is scared, and the people around him are afraid because they’ve never seen anything like him. He wanted to show that not only is he amazing and he’s sure of himself and confident, but he’s never gonna change, he’s never gonna be exorcised. Even when they throw the holy water on him, he still rises above.”
Despite her benevolent intentions, the performance still seems to be turning a few heads, particularly that of Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League. While his recent feuds have been with President Obama's strides to ensure that all women working at Catholic institutions are supplied with insurance that covers birth control, Donohue had a few words to share about Minaj's show.
“Perhaps the most vulgar part was the sexual statement that showed a scantily clad female dancer stretching backwards while an altar boy knelt between her legs in prayer.” Maureen Dowd, an op-ed writer for The New York Times, believes this might be a reflection of the renewed fascination with exorcism displayed frequently in current film and literature.
“The satanic rap was merely the latest illustration of the renewed fascination with the ancient rite of exorcism. After languishing in the Catholic Church, exorcisms are back in fashion. In 2004, worried about the rise of the occult, Pope John Paul II asked Cardinal Ratzinger, the head of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith who went on to become Pope Benedict XVI, to direct bishops around the world to appoint and train exorcists in their dioceses,” Dowd recently wrote. “The infusion of Hispanic and African Catholics to the U.S., with their more intense belief in the supernatural, has brought a fresh demand.”
As for Nicki's reaction, she handled it the way she handles all negative criticism – she’s laughing all the way to the bank. She cites Lil Wayne as having been a big influence in teaching her how to take the heat and avoid beefs with others.
“He's definitely told me, ‘Yo, leave that bullshit alone. That's for people who ain't got shit else to do.’ I've watched Wayne handle himself so well. I've seen people take shot after shot after shot at him and if it fazed him, I never saw it. People take shots because they're hoping for a little bit of your energy. They need fuel.” Taking his advice to heart, Nicki doesn't let the bad get her down. Instead, she just lets it all slide off her back.