Early favorites

Oscar shuffle: Hugo & The Artist get the nominations, Spielberg & Drive getsnubbed

Hugo received the most nominations of any movie, with 11.
Meryl Streep is the favorite to take home the Best Actress award for her uncannyportrayal of Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady
Viola Davis could score an upset in the Best Actress category for The Help
Photo by Dale Robinette/DreamWorks II Distribution Co., LLC
Best pals George Clooney, left, and Brad Pitt are both up for Best Actor.Clooney is expected to win for The Descendents. Pitt could score an upset forMoneyball.
The Artist is the favorite for Best Picture. It received 10 Oscar nominations.

One thing we now know for certain, lest we ever harbored any doubts: The voting members of the Academy for Motion Picture Arts and Sciences sure love them some movies.

Consider: When nominations for the 84th annual Academy Awards were announced Tuesday morning, the leaders of the pack were Hugo (11 nominations), Martin Scorsese’s exhilaratingly loving ode to the enduring allure of cinema, and The Artist (10 nominations), Michel Hazanavicius’ playfully clever comedy about a silent movie star’s bumpy transition to talkies.

Add the two acting nominations that went to My Week With Marilyn, Simon Curtis’ fanciful dramedy about Marilyn Monroe’s off-camera misadventures during the 1956 filming of The Princess and the Showgirl, and you can’t help suspecting that, this year, the voters were in a mood to celebrate their art and industry – and, yes, themselves.

There were, as always, some surprises, both pleasant and otherwise, across the board in this year’s list of Oscar nominees. Mexican-born actor Damien Bichir’s Best Actor nomination for his acclaimed portrayal of an undocumented worker in the critically lauded but relatively little-seen (by audiences, at least) A Better Life indicates that, yes, sometimes the Academy ignores the hype and gives one from the heart.

It’s reasonably safe to assume at least one Hollywood heavyweight isn’t feeling much love today.

On the other hand: The conspicuous absence of Steven Spielberg from the Best Director lineup (despite a Best Picture nod for his War Horse) and the snub of his Adventures of Tintin in the Animated Feature category indicates… Well, it may be rash to rush to judgment. (According to an old newsroom joke, the best definition for a trend: Two facts and a reporter on deadline.) But it’s reasonably safe to assume at least one Hollywood heavyweight isn’t feeling much love today.

Speaking subjectively, I’m very sorry to note the total and complete shut-outs of Win-Win, Young Adult and 50/50, three worthy 2011 releases that richly deserved recognition in a number of categories. (And before anyone says that Charlize Theron was overlooked for Best Actress because she played an unsympathetic character in Young Adult – well, d’uh, she won the Oscar for playing a freakin’ serial killer in Monster, remember?)

On the other hand, I’m happy to see an Original Screenplay nod for Margin Call, and even happier to see Undefeated (a 2011 SXSW Film Festival premiere coming soon to a theater near you) crack the final five in the Best Documentary category.

And at the risk of enraging those fervent fans of Drive – and you know who you are, so don’t be coy about it – who boldly predicted Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor and, gee, I dunno, Best Catering nominations… Look, folks, it was a good movie. But it wasn’t that good. Honest.

Right now, the serious Oscar soothsayers and obsessively blogging handicappers are calling The Artist the front-runner in the Best Picture race. But from where I sit in the bleachers, The Descendants appears poised to score an upset, with Hugo trailing not so far behind. And if you doubt that an underdog could ever triumph over a designated sure thing in this category, go talk to the makers of Reds and On Golden Pond about the year that Chariots of Fire left them standing in the dust.

What follows is my overview of the top Oscar races. Take it with as many grains of salt as you care to sprinkle.

ACTOR IN LEADING ROLE

Damien Bichir, A Better Life; George Clooney, The Descendants; Jean Dujardin, The Artist; Brad Pitt, Moneyball; Gary Oldman, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.

Likely Winner: George Clooney

Possible Upset: Jean Dujardin

Conspicuous by Absence: Joseph Gordon-Levitt for 50/50

ACTRESS IN LEADING ROLE

Glenn Close, Albert Nobbs; Viola Davis, The Help; Rooney Mara, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo; Meryl Streep, The Iron Lady; Michelle Williams, My Week with Marilyn.

Likely Winner: Meryl Streep

Possible Upset: Viola Davis

Conspicuous by Absence: Charlize Theron for Young Adult

ACTOR IN SUPPORTING ROLE

Kenneth Branagh, My Week With Marilyn; Nick Nolte, Warrior; Christopher Plummer, Beginners; Max von Sydow, Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close; Jonah Hill, Moneyball.

Likely Winner: Christopher Plummer

Possible Upset: Nick Nolte

Conspicuous by Absence: Albert Brooks for Drive and Ben Kingsley for Hugo

ACTRESS IN SUPPORTING ROLE

Berenice Bejo, The Artist; Jessica Chastain, The Help; Melissa McCarthy, Bridesmaids; Octavia Spencer, The Help; Janet McTeer, Albert Nobbs.

Likely Winner: Octavia Spencer

Possible Upset: Melissa McCarthy

Conspicuous by Absence: Shailene Woodley for The Descendants

ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

Michel Hazanavicius, The Artist; Annie Mumolo and Kristen Wiig, Bridesmaids; J.C. Chandor, Margin Call; Woody Allen, Midnight in Paris; Asghar Farhadi, A Separation.

Likely Winner: Woody Allen

Possible Upset: Michel Hazanavicius

Conspicuous by Absence: Diablo Cody for Young Adult and Will Reiser for 50/50.

ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

Alexander Payne, Nat Faxon and Jim Rash, The Descendants; John Logan, Hugo; George Clooney, Grant Heslov and Beau Willimon, The Ides of March; Steven Zaillian, Aaron Sorkin and Stan Chervin, Moneyball; Bridget O'Connor and Peter Straughan, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.

Likely Winner: The Descendants

Possible Upset: Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

Conspicuous by Absence: War Horse

DIRECTOR

Michel Hazanavicius, The Artist; Alexander Payne, The Descendants; Martin Scorsese, Hugo; Woody Allen, Midnight in Paris; Terrence Malick, The Tree of Life.

Likely Winner: Martin Scorsese

Possible Upset: Michel Hazanavicius

Conspicuous by Absence: Steven Spielberg for War Horse

BEST PICTURE

The Artist, The Descendants, Hugo, The Help, Midnight in Paris, War Horse, Moneyball, Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, The Tree of Life.

Likely Winner: The Artist

Possible Upset: The Descendants

Conspicuous by Absence: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

The 84th Academy Awards ceremony will be presented Feb. 26 at the Kodak Theatre at Hollywood & Highland Center, hosted by Billy Crystal. Of course, I’ll be watching.

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Creed concert review

Creed serve up millennial nostalgia at pyro-packed RodeoHouston concert

Courtesy of Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo

Singer Scott Stapp serenades the RodeoHouston crowd.

Hello, my friend, we meet again.

I’ve had a torrid relationship with Creed. As a circa-2000s punk rocker, it was implied that I was supposed to hate them. Nevertheless, I enjoyed those hook-laden Mark Tremonti riffs and Scott Stapp’s burly, Bono-grasping vocals, with just a hint of irony deep in the mix. I had “One Last Breath” on a burned mix CD, bunched in with Fugazi, Rancid, and Sham 69. I would skip it as quickly as I could, depending on who was in the car. Driving home from a long day slinging milk in the Kroger dairy cooler? Windows down, Stapp up.

When I began my music journalism career 20 years ago (!!!), I began sticking up for them, much to the consternation of a lot of my fellow writers who were hung up on stuff that was supposed to be cooler and hipper. Creed’s pop-culture zenith came right as The Strokes and The White Stripes were thrust on us by the music press as a counter to post-grunge, which other music writers were categorically allergic to. Remember when our biggest problems in America were bands that were overtly influenced by Pearl Jam and Alice In Chains?

In 2012, I interviewed lead singer Scott Stapp along the way for the Houston Press, and I distinctly recall Stapp being confused on our call that a guy from a smug alt-weekly wasn’t asking him stupid questions or making fun of his leather pants. The band was heading to Houston for a two-night stand at the Bayou Music Center in 2012 when they played 1997’s “My Own Prison” and 1999’s “Human Clay” in their entirety.

Fun fact: “Human Clay” has sold over 20 million albums alone, besting Nirvana’s “Nevermind” and Pearl Jam’s “Ten” by only a relatively small margin. Creed moved more physical CDs when people actually bought music.

Somehow, along the way, people stopped hating Creed and Nickelback, and the hate gave way to pre-social media, millennial high school, and pre-9/11 nostalgia. The similarly maligned Nickelback sold out the rodeo in 2024.

On Wednesday, March 11, I saw junior high school kids wearing crispy new Creed shirts with their parents. Gen Alpha is beginning to get curious about what mom and dad were up to during spring break 2001, and Zoomers are rediscovering Y2K fashions. Haven’t you seen those “Mom, What Were You Like In The ‘90s?” memes?

Creed has been sold out for weeks, drawing 70,007 attendees. If you had told someone 10 years ago that Creed would sell out RodeoHouston, they would have been skeptical. And yet here we are, staring down at a sold-out Creed show. These things run in cycles. Emotions fade. Annoyance turns into wistfulness for the days of Nokia brick phones and 99-cent gas. You can even go on a Creed Cruise now.

Creed hit the stage just before 9:30 pm, an enviable bedtime for most elderly millennials, kicking off with the TOOL-chugalug of “Bullets,” with Stapp and Tremonti making the best use of their stage platforms, crucial devices for any major rock band in the 2000s. Unrelenting pyro shot from the dirt surrounding the stage every time Stapp lifted or flailed his arms like Elvis if he discovered cardio.

The dirge of “Torn” — the second single from My Own Prison — was pyro-less, likely giving the cannons a few minutes to cool off. The sweaty Stapp, at just 52, looks to be in better shape than he did 20 years ago, now sporting a conservative haircut like he stepped out of his company’s stadium suite or finished a twilight run at Memorial Park.

Stapp introduced “My Own Prison” with a preachery pep talk that wouldn’t sound out of place at an altar call at Sturgis. The crowd hung on every emphatic word. Maybe seeing two middle-aged dudes wearing Stryper shirts down on the concourse made more sense than I realized. Is Creed actually just TOOL that accepted Christ? The graphics behind the band could’ve fooled me.

Stapp introduced “One” with a speech on commonalities and love. Looking back, Creed’s lyrics were much too earnest, hitting at a time when critics were still hungover from grunge.

During “With Arms Wide Open,” the rodeo cameras would routinely cut to tattooed dads and rocker chicks in the crowd playing air guitar along with Tremonti and singing their guts out like they did the first time they heard it on 94.5 The Buzz. For a large segment of the crowd, they might have had a Gen-X parent jamming this stuff on the way to school in the morning.

“Are you ready to get higher in here, Houston?” Stapp yells. The place erupts as “Higher” starts. Stapp was in his element, pyro shooting off, his silver jewelry dangling, taking in the crowd, like he didn’t expect such a response.

Possibly the last true rock power ballad ever recorded, “One Last Breath,” got the biggest screams of the night; it might also be the Gen-Z “Don’t Stop Believing” as long as we’re making wildly controversial statements. [Editor’s note: Isn’t that Mr. Brightside? -ES]

Welcome back, Creed, from pop-culture purgatory, and props for what might have been the loudest RodeoHouston show in years.

SETLIST

Bullets
Torn
Are You Ready?
My Own Prison
What If
One
With Arms Wide Open
Higher
One Last Breath
My Sacrifice

Courtesy of Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo

Singer Scott Stapp serenades the RodeoHouston crowd.

rodeohouston houston livestock show and rodeo concert review