The Aggies and local legends will open for country's king.
Photo courtesy of RodeoHouston
In what could be arguably billed as the country music show of the year, Robert Earl Keen and Lyle Lovett will open for country king George Strait during his RodeoHouston concert-only performance on Sunday, March 17, 2019. Strait’s show caps the final night of the 2019 rodeo.
Houston native Lovett (and his gravity-defying hair) played RodeoHouston in 2001 and 2002. Meanwhile, Keen has taken the RodeoHouston stage in 2000, 2001, 2003, 2004, and 2006. Country fans and Aggies are no doubt aware that Keen and Lovett met at Texas A&M University and used to strum their acoustic guitars on Lovett’s porch. Those freeform days gave birth to their single, “The Front Porch Song.”
Keen and Lovett were inducted into the Texas Heritage Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2012. The two friends have played a series of acoustic shows together, including last year with Strait during his Hurricane Harvey relief concert in San Antonio.
“We are proud to close out the 2019 Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo with three of the Lone Star State’s most influential music artists,” says Joel Cowley, rodeo president and CEO. The 2019 Rodeo will run for 21 days, from Monday, February 25 through Sunday, March 17, 2019. For fans keeping score, the remaining 2019 RodeoHouston entertainment lineup will be announced January 3, 2019.
Horror comedies tend to be a good entry point for non-hardcore fans of the genre, as they provide for a good amount of levity amongst the carnage shown on screen. Examples like the original Scream, Shaun of the Dead, and Get Out keep the spirit of horror alive while still giving the audience plenty of laughs.
Writer/director Osgood Perkins, who wowed some genre fans with Longlegs in 2024, is back with a much different type of film in The Monkey. Based on a Stephen King short story, the film features a villain who is not a person, but rather an organ grinder monkey toy that inexplicably causes the death of someone nearby when activated.
The toy changes hands a few times in the film, but always seems to come back into the lives of twin brothers Hal and Bill (Christian Convery as a child, Theo James as an adult). No matter what they do, they cannot rid themselves of the monkey, and few in their orbit are safe from its unexplained wrath.
The high points of the short, 95-minute film are unquestionably its many kills, which are heightened to a degree that laughter is pretty much the only response if you’re willing to go along with it. The deaths seem to increase in absurdity as the film goes along, and the inventiveness of each one makes it feel like Perkins drew inspiration from the Final Destination series.
The problem for the film comes in Perkins’ storytelling outside of the violence. There’s little that’s compelling about the lives of Hal and Bill other than the tragedies they witness along the way. Their times with their mother (Tatiana Maslany), aunt and uncle (Sarah Levy and Perkins himself), and others fail to have any meaningful impact, and their own twisted relationship is too odd to be fully involving, as well.
Because of the disparity between the violent and non-violent parts of the film, the film never maintains any kind of momentum. To be fair, Perkins spends a lot of time with his main characters, but because their stories fail to inspire, it feels like the film is just twiddling its thumbs until it can get to the next over-the-top kill. The mystery of the monkey is okay, but could have been enhanced.
Despite some high-profile roles (the Divergent series, The White Lotus), James is somewhat of a blank slate as an actor, and he feels miscast here.. The dual roles can be tricky to pull off, and he never makes either twin brother pop. Maslany is given the showiest role and it’s fun to see her ham it up to a degree. The oddest casting goes to Elijah Wood, who shows up in a cameo that leaves many questions about his character going unanswered.
It’s unclear why Perkins didn’t commit fully to the comedy part of The Monkey, as the scenes that go all-in in that respect are the best ones in the film. But anytime he veers away from them, the movie gets less interesting, and ultimately the balance goes too far in the wrong direction.
