Boy in Bad Bunny Super Bowl halftime show is from Costa Mesa
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If you’re thinking of scheduling a power lunch sometime this week with Lincoln Fox Ramadan — the 5-year-old boy who appeared in Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl halftime show Sunday — you’ll have to leave a message.
The Costa Mesa kindergartener’s inbox is kind of blowing up, after more than 128 million viewers saw him in a live-action scene, during which the singer handed the youngster his Grammy award for album of the year and patted him on the head.
Fresh off the heels of Sunday’s broadcast, Lincoln’s agent acknowledged her firm was receiving “a high volume of inquiries” regarding her client’s 11-second appearance, which featured him representing the Puerto Rican superstar as a young boy .
That fact was confirmed Wednesday by Lincoln’s mom, Erika Ramadan, who said the day after the Super Bowl was a bit of a whirlwind as the family conducted interviews with news crews and fielded more than a dozen media requests.
“On Sunday, right after the game, we started getting calls,” said Ramadan, who’d picked up her son early from his first day back at school and was transporting him to an interview with “Access Hollywood” as she spoke with the Daily Pilot. “People were calling grandparents, aunts and uncles — they were just finding family members’ numbers.”
Sunday’s halftime show was significant, not only for being one of the most watched in 60 years, but also as the first Spanish language performance during the internationally broadcast event. Similarly, Bad Bunny’s Grammy-winning album, ‘Débi Tirar Más Fotos’ (I Should’ve Taken More Photos), was the first entirely Spanish-language album to win top honors.
Ramadan said she and husband Islam had no idea when they sent an audition video to their son’s agent exactly what they were trying out for. It wasn’t until they got the legal agreement in the mail that they saw mention of the Super Bowl and began connecting the dots.
By the time they went to a first rehearsal in January, they learned Lincoln would be portraying the singer, whose real name is Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, as a child. After numerous practice rounds, both with Bad Bunny and a stand-in, Lincoln was ready.
“It was such a tender moment,” his mom said of the Super Bowl vignette, which features Lincoln accepting the singer’s actual Grammy award, won just a week earlier. “The stadium just sort of paused — I think it was the genuineness of the moment, the image of going back in time and talking to your little self and saying, don’t give up.”
Although the youngster had to return the award to a handler, who immediately cleaned it with a polishing rag, the excitement of the experience is sure to last a lifetime.
Locally, Lincoln is taking Orange County by storm, as photos, video clips and news interviews with him and his parents appear in posts from Newport-Mesa Unified School District and the city of Costa Mesa, the latter of which used the boy’s likeness to celebrate having reached 20,000 followers on Instagram, a milestone in a municipality comprising 109,000 residents.
“How we feel reaching 20K Instagram followers!” city officials proclaimed above an image of a smiling Lincoln hugging the Grammy award. “Bonus hometown pride: the kid holding that Grammy? A Costa Mesa local. Proof that big dreams grow right here. We’re proud of you!”
Updates
12:53 p.m. Feb. 11, 2026: This story was updated to include an interview with Lincoln’s mom, Erika Ramadan.
