It’s all about Bears, Colts and a Prince with clowns

Three days before the Super Bowl, and I am dutifully taking notes at a news conference for a man wearing orange high heels.

“Go, Johnny go,” said Prince Rogers Nelson. “Go Johnny go.”

Three days before the Super Bowl, and I am dutifully taking notes at a news conference for mimes.

Peck, peck, peck. A woman dressed like a toucan, crouched next to me, is pounding her bill on my head.

Three days before the Super Bowl, and after two weeks of bells and whistles and women dressed like referees riding upon men dressed like storks, one question has gone unanswered.

What about the game?

The Indianapolis Colts are playing the Chicago Bears on Sunday, but you wouldn’t know it for all the diamond-studded soda raffles and soup news briefings and centerfold parties.

There are stories and news releases and parties for football players building houses, football players donating money to youth centers, football players bowling at the Dolphin Mall.

Are there any football players actually, you know, playing football?

The week’s activities are outlined in a book of 35 pages -- in which the game rates one paragraph.

On Thursday, the news release touting the pregame show was 10 pages. The official reports on the teams’ practices were one page each.

“I think people always recognize this game as a form of entertainment,” said Billy Joel, shrugging.

With black baseball cap and black leather jacket and trademark scowl, Joel on Thursday appeared in three consecutive news conferences that did not include one person directly involved in the game.

He’s singing the national anthem, which would be really cool and smoky and soulful except for two things:

First, he didn’t appear to know who was playing in the game. “I always root for New York,” he said.

Second, he is no fan of the national anthem.

“It’s a tough song, not the greatest song ever written,” he said. “ ‘America the Beautiful’ is actually a better song.

“Nobody remembers the lyrics, and they don’t know what they mean. It’s kind of a slog, really.”

Joel repeatedly said he couldn’t believe he was actually appearing at a news conference for a two-minute song.

One can only imagine, then, how the Cirque du Soleil folks must have felt.

The acrobatic pregame performers also held a news conference, and they don’t even speak.

“We want to bring happiness and hope,” said Romero Britto, guest creator for the show.

As Britto spoke, a man with a blue face and wearing a Colts jersey and blue boxer shorts came walking through the crowd with a football perched awkwardly in his hand, posing like Heisman but walking like a chicken.

“What’s that guy doing here?” I asked.

“Um, it’s his press conference,” a colleague replied.

Sure enough, soon there were six odd figures jumping around the room, two wearing referees jerseys and riding human storks, two dressed like toucans, and two in that odd football garb.

When I asked Britto if there would be anything in his show even faintly resembling football, that’s when one of the toucans leaped to the empty seat next to me and began pecking my head.

“There will be the spirit of football, and American things,” he said.

The Super Bowl is indeed an American thing, and it indeed has increasingly nothing to do with football.

Quick, what has been the most memorable moment in recent Super Bowl history?

It didn’t involve Tom Brady’s right arm or Adam Vinatieri’s right foot, but Janet Jackson’s right breast.

Can you name the most popular Super Bowl souvenir?

It’s not Joe Montana’s jersey, it’s Whitney Houston’s anthem -- which sold more than a million copies.

The greatest game may have been the first one after 9/11, and not because Vinatieri’s New England Patriots beat the St. Louis Rams on a last-second field goal.

Remember? It featured Paul McCartney in the pregame show, Mariah Carey singing the national anthem, former president George H.W. Bush doing the coin toss, and U2 singing at halftime.

The worst Super Bowl may have been XXVII at the Rose Bowl, and not because the Dallas Cowboys blew out the Buffalo Bills.

O.J. Simpson tossed the coin, and Michael Jackson and 3,500 local children were the halftime show.

The Super Bowl entertainment has featured kings and jesters and, now, a Prince.

The singer showed up at Thursday’s final major news conference but wouldn’t take questions.

Hands were raised and a query was made, at which point he immediately turned to his band and began playing a three-song set.

The small room rocked. The gathered media shuddered and stared.

“More, more, more” Prince pleaded in lyrics.

Three days before the Super Bowl and I’m wondering, how is that possible?

Bill Plaschke can be reached at bill.plaschke@latimes.com. To read previous columns by Plaschke, go to latimes.com/plaschke.