Left Shark

Left Shark (left) performing at the halftime show

"Left Shark" is the name of a background dancer from Katy Perry's performance at the Super Bowl XLIX halftime show in 2015. Left Shark received significant fan and media attention during and after the halftime performance because of its distinct dance moves, which were both offbeat and out of sync to the "Right Shark" on Perry's left, house right. Left Shark quickly became an Internet sensation, appearing on social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter and also became an internet meme.^[1]

The Super Bowl halftime show director Hamish Hamilton later claimed that the Left Shark performance was inspired by a Scissor Sisters performance in the 2005 Brit Awards, where the group played "Take Your Mama" in front of a surreal farmyard with massive bird-like puppets. Hamilton stated that, "We were trying to work out how we could bring a beach scene to life and so one of the references that we looked at was that Scissor Sisters' performance. The genesis of the Left Shark was actually a singing melon." ^[2] In another interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Perry's choreographer RJ Durell claimed that the Left Shark's performance was intentional, stating their objectives were to "perform Katy's trademark moves to the 'Teenage Dream' chorus, which they both did perfectly" and "have loads of fun, and bring to life these characters in a cartoon manner, giving them a Tweedledee/Tweedledum-type persona".^[3] The identities of both sharks were later revealed to be Perry's longtime background dancers Scott Myrick (Right Shark) and Bryan Gaw (Left Shark).^[4] Gaw later admitted that he in fact was the man beneath the Left Shark costume on his Twitter and Instagram accounts.^[3]

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