GEORGE LUCAS INSISTS IT’S POSSIBLE TO ‘NUKE THE FRIDGE’

Dear George,

Please see: Holes, first rule of.

Signed,
America

People wouldn’t have cared anything about the fridge thing had the rest of the movie not been so awful… and stupid. I doubt very much an inflatable life raft works like a parachute when it’s filled with people and thrown out of a plane. But we suspended disbelief for that because the third act of “Doom” made us wet our pants.

THR REVIEWS ‘RED TAILS’

The experience of black American aviators in World War II gets a whitewash in Red Tails. The story of the 996 pilots (and some 15,000 ground personnel) who distinguished themselves in the air in the face of institutional racism is a great one and, at least, will come to the attention of more people due to this long-gestating project from Lucasfilm. But every character here is so squeaky clean, and the prejudice as depicted is so toothless and easily overcome, that the film feels like a gingerly fantasy version of what, in real life, was an exceptional example of resilient trail-blazing. The tale’s considerable built-in inspirational value will move and impress black audiences of all ages and would do the same to a wider public if sufficiently promoted, but the determinedly simplistic approach will curtail interest among any viewers hungry for some real history. The anticipated low interest level for this material overseas is cited as a major reason the project took so long to get off the ground.

Related: George Lucas Heading For a Big Disappointment with ‘Red Tails’

I feel for George Lucas. I like him a lot personally. But I’ve just read the long piece in yesterday’s New York Times about “Red Tails.” Also, I followed his interview on “The Daily Show.” He really feels that his movie won’t get a fair shake because it’s only got black actors. He also thinks if it fails, black directors will have a lot of trouble getting their movies made. Here’s the problem: “Red Tails” is a bad movie. White actors wouldn’t have changed that. Plenty of all-black or mostly black acted films do business and get accolades. “The Help” is a hit. Last week, the Critics Choice Awards gave Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress to two black actors–Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer. Has there been racism in Hollywood? Yes, indeed. But that’s not what this is about.

CONGRATULATIONS TO SCOTT HYMAN WHO JUST LAUNCHED ZEST PRODUCTIONS

Scott is one of my closest friends, an experienced feature producer, and someone who I only have good memories of working with in the deep, dark trenches of the indie world. He just went out on his own with a fascinating project:

The first project from the former Sneak Preview Entertainment exec is a screen adaptation of a 1974 young adult sci-fi novel, “House of Stairs,” by the late William Sleator.

TORONTO – Former Sneak Preview Entertainment exec Scott G. Hyman (500 Days of Summer) has launched a Vancouver-based production shingle, Zest Productions, to make movies in Canada.

The first project is a screen adaptation of a 1974 young adult sci-fi novel, House of Stairs, by the late American writer William Sleator, whose rights Hyman optioned.

Montreal-based genre writer Doug Taylor has been hired to adapt the story about five orphaned teens in a dystopian near future suffering psychological exploitation in a seemingly endless Escher-like space of stairs.

Taylor co-wrote the $25 million sci-fi thriller Splice, which starred Adrien Brody and Sarah Polley, with director Vincenzo Natali.

The VFX-heavy House of Stairs project is to be shot in Montreal to take advantage of local tax breaks for live action/CGI hybrids, with packaging to take place in the second half of 2012.

More here.

KATHERINE HEIGL WANTS TO RETURN TO ‘GREY’S ANATOMY’

Humbled, no doubt. She had a real shot at being America’s new sweetheart and worked as hard to blow it as anyone ever has.

ULTRAVIOLET COPIES ATTRACT MORE THAN 750,000 HOUSEHOLDS IN FIRST 3 MONTHS

But will this sell more Blu-rays?

Following the launch of an initial 19 UltraViolet-enabled titles, more than 750,000 households have registered with UltraViolet to create and start using personal digital libraries.

The audience of registered users is expected to grow exponentially in the year ahead, as Hollywood studios offering UltraViolet films and TV shows, through UltraViolet-enabled DVDs and Blu-rays as well as electronic sell through (EST), plan to dramatically expand the scope and scale of UltraViolet.

750,000 people signing up for UV is news, that’s for sure. You do have to pro-actively create that account. But will enough people see the value in the technology to buy titles they might not have otherwise?

I doubt it.

However, will the customers find enough value in titles they already own to buy them again just to enjoy that technology?

We shall see.

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN ALBUM ‘WRECKING BALL’ SET FOR MARCH 6 RELEASE

My indifference is stoked and ready to go.

‘RESIDENT EVIL: RETRIBUTION 3D’ TRAILER PREMIERE

Counting. The. Days.

In theaters September 14 from director Paul W.S. Anderson, “The Umbrella Corporation’s deadly T-virus continues to ravage the Earth, transforming the global population into legions of the flesh eating Undead. The human race’s last and only hope, Alice (Milla Jovovich), awakens in the heart of Umbrella’s most clandestine operations facility and unveils more of her mysterious past as she delves further into the complex. Without a safe haven, Alice continues to hunt those responsible for the outbreak; a chase that takes her from Tokyo to New York, Washington, D.C. and Moscow, culminating in a mind-blowing revelation that will force her to rethink everything that she once thought to be true. Aided by newfound allies and familiar friends, Alice must fight to survive long enough to escape a hostile world on the brink of oblivion. The countdown has begun.”

Mock Paul W. S. Anderson all you want, fanboys, but at least he uses a goddamn tripod.

COMING SOON ON HOME VIDEO: ‘WINGS,’ SOMETHING FOR THE KIDS

WINGS: Paramount Home Entertainment kicks off the studio’s centennial celebration in 2012 by releasing the inaugural Best Picture Academy Award® winner WINGS for the first time ever on Blu-ray™ and DVD

January 24, 2012.  Meticulously restored to give fans the chance to view the visually stunning epic in pristine condition, the 1927 World War I drama explores the devastating effects of war through the story of two men who go off to battle and the woman they both leave behind.  Featuring groundbreaking aerial dogfights and epic battle sequences, WINGS is both a cinematic spectacle and a compelling story of love and sacrifice that effectively dramatizes the bitter wages of war.  The historic piece of cinema stars Clara Bow, Charles “Buddy” Rogers and Richard Arlen, and also features Gary Cooper in one of his first feature film roles.

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My Little Pony Friendship is Magic: The Friendship Express will arrive on DVD on February 28, 2012, from Shout! Factory in collaboration with Hasbro Studios. Featuring 5 pony-riffic episodes, Friendship is Magic: The Friendship Express will also offer bonus features such as  Meet the Ponies, sing-a-longs and coloring sheets. It will also include “Yipper Caper,” the very first episode of the new Pound Puppies series.

WIN A FABULOUS TRIP TO A DESTINATION INSPIRED BY ONE OF PARAMOUNT’S CLASSIC MOVIES

HOLLYWOOD CA – Paramount Home Media Distribution (PHMD) announced today that it will launch a monthly sweepstakes beginning in January 2012 in honor of the studio’s centennial celebration.  Sponsored by Delta Vacations, the sweepstakes will give consumers the chance to win roundtrip airfare and hotel accommodations for three nights in any of the 48 contiguous United States*.

Destinations may include cities inspired by some of Paramount’s classic films such as New York City where Francis Ford Coppola’s epic masterpiece The Godfather and the beloved classic Breakfast At Tiffany’s were filmed; Chicago, IL where Ferris Bueller had the best day off ever; San Antonio, TX, where the breathtaking drama Wings was filmed with a cast of thousands; or Hollywood, CA, setting and subject of Sunset Boulevard and home to countless film productions.  Visitors to Paramount’s Facebook page—facebook.com/paramount—can enter every month throughout the year.

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LAST NIGHT’S SCREENING

Shakespeare In Love (1998) on Blu-ray. Review coming.

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SCOTTDS’ EPIC LINKTACULAR

FOX ORDERS SPY DRAMA FROM ‘SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES’ SHOWRUNNER JOSH FRIEDMAN

END OF AN ERA? KODAK FILES FOR BANKRUPTCY PROTECTION

AUTHOR CORMAC MCCARTHY SELLS SPEC SCRIPT ‘THE COUNSELOR‘

‘JUSTIFIED’ SEASON 3 PREMIERE RATINGS DOWN VS. SEASON 2 PREMIERE

COMCAST IS ROLLING OUT ANYPLAY LIVE TV FEATURE FOR IPAD USERS

PETER BERG AND WILL SMITH STILL PLANNING A ‘HANCOCK’ SEQUEL

ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER AND ITV TO SEARCH FOR ‘JESUS IN SUPERSTAR’ REALITY SHOW

DAVID KAJGANICH WRITING BEN AFFLECK’S ‘THE STAND’

INFOGRAPHIC: WHY THE MOVIE INDUSTRY IS WRONG ABOUT SOPA

BOBCAT GOLDTHWAIT’S ‘GOD BLESS AMERICA’ HITS VOD IN APRIL; POSTER DEBUTS TODAY

WHY NO FILM SHOULD BE CONSIDERED UNREMARKABLE

FRANK DARABONT DISCUSSES ‘THE WALKING DEAD’ EXIT & NEW SERIES ‘L.A. NOIR’

11 BEST FOREIGN FILMS OF 2011

WHEN ROMANTIC COMEDIES ROAMED THE OSCARS

THE FIRST SCI-FI MOVIE FILMED IN SPACE TO REMAIN UNDERGROUND

A LOOK BACK AT ‘LAST ACTION HERO‘

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CLASSIC PICK FOR FRIDAY,  JANUARY 20

TCM:

1:15 PM  EST: Hasty Heart, The (1950) –  Doctors try to get a flinty Scots soldier to open up to his comrades before telling him he’s dying. Dir: Vincent Sherman Cast:  Ronald Reagan, Patricia Neal, Richard Todd. BW-102 mins, TV-PG, CC.

Very touching, underrated film with an unforgettable performance from Richard Todd and nice support from Ronald Reagan and Patricia Neal. Big themes here.

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Please send comments, suggestions and tips to jnolte@breitbart.com or Twitter @NolteNC.

The shaggy crooner is the exception to the rule.

FoxNews.com reports that most singers balk when a Republican wants to co-op their songs for campaign events. Things are mighty different when it’s a Democratic politician singing a familiar song.

On the other hand, Bill Clinton used Fleetwood Mac’s “Don’t Stop” in his successful 1992 presidential bid, Democratic Sen. John F. Kerry played Springsteen’s “No Surrender” in his 2004 campaign, in 2008 Sen. Barack Obama revived Springsteen’s “The Rising,” and that same year fellow Democrat John Edwards used Mellancamp’s “Our Country.” All of these came and went without objection from the artists. In fact, except for 2008, when Barack Obama was sent a “cease and desist” letter from the legal team for Sam Moore (one half of the legendary duo Sam & Dave) over the unlicensed use of “Hold On, I’m Comin’” as background beat at his rallies, its hard to find examples of Democrats getting taken to task.

“I would say certainly in recent years, there’s been a greater unlicensed use of songs by Republican candidates,” Iser, said. “The point that the musician is making is not about the [political] party. The position they’re taking is: This is what we do for a living, we are protected by copyright, and if you’re running for election, you need to respect the law. It just is a coincidence really, simple as that.”

Iser stresses that when it comes to music and campaigns, artists and songwriters only want to protect their intellectual property rights and ensure that they aren’t involuntary endorsers of candidates and campaign messages.

So … it is about the message after all. Why not say so in the first place?

The fallout from Janet Jackson’s infamous “wardrobe malfunction” back in 2004 ensured subsequent acts were chosen for their family-friendly appeal. That meant older, less threatening rockers like U2, Bruce Springsteen and Tom Petty got the call, while Lady Gaga was left to watch the game at home on her big screen TV.

That, inexplicably enough, leads us to Madonna. The Material Girl will be performing at the Super Bowl halftime show Feb. 5 along with Cirque du Soleil.

Madonna has come a long way, baby.

The 50-something songstress started her career as a flashy – but mostly clean – singer belting out hits like “Borderline” and “Lucky Star.” She quickly ramped up her sex appeal, published a naughty coffee table book and incorporated all manner of lewd behavior into her stage act.

In short, she reveled in shocking us early and often, and the media couldn’t get enough of her. Then, motherhood came calling, and suddenly Madonna seemed more interested in writing children’s books than offending the masses.

The Super Bowl gig means Madonna has come full circle. It’s a sign of maturation, both professional and personal, and an understanding that shock value has a limited shelf life.

A new report from Republican Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma, “Subsidies of the Rich and Famous,” reveals a number of high-profile liberals have been sucking at the public teat. Perhaps being part of the 1 percent just isn’t enough to make ends meet these days.

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) identified several individuals receiving farm payments “whose professions had nothing to do with farming or agricultur[e],” says the report.

The report also says millionaires Jon Bon Jovi, Bruce Springsteen and Ted Turner have collected farm subsidies.

“For example, Jon Bon Jovi paid property taxes of only $100 last year on his extensive real estate holdings in New Jersey that he uses to raise bees. At the same time, Bruce Springsteen received farm subsidies because he leases his property to an organic farmer,” the report explains.

But what if those subsidies simply aren’t enough for the likes of Bon Jovi and Springsteen? Let’s pass around the hat and do all we can to make sure our “farming” friends can keep workin’ the land and writing great songs about those New Jersey girls.

It seems Springsteen is upset with Christie’s ongoing battle against government expenditures, particularly public entitlements. And as liberals and hard left ideologues like Michael Moore and Susan Sarandon have done against Republican Governor Scott Walker in Wisconsin, so Springsteen is now doing against Christie in New Jersey.

Wrote Springsteen: “[Christie’s] cuts are eating away at the lower edges of the middle class, not just those already classified as in poverty, and are likely to continue to get worse over the next few years.” (If you’re like me, when you read Springsteen’s words all you see is “blah, blah, blah, and blah.”)

Honestly folks, I’m beginning to get embarrassed for him in the way I’ve come to be embarrassed for Larry Hagman’s family and Al Gore apologists.

Springsteen demonstrates no grasp of American political history–particularly the history that proves shrinking the size of government, like Christie is doing, results in greater wealth for all.

And while I’m embarrassed for Springsteen, I’m also appalled by his hypocrisy. I mean, here is a man who takes advantage of the system in order to keep from paying all the taxes he’s supposed to pay in his home state of New Jersey: which means he’s making sure his money isn’t in the system to be distributed to those less fortunate ones whom he’s accusing Christie of overlooking.

When I was an impressionable youth with no direction in life, I went to a couple of Springsteen concerts during the mid-1980s. Like many at that time, I hadn’t grasped the fact that Springsteen’s thematic “Born in the U.S.A.” wasn’t praising this great country but condemning it.  Yet I’ve long since figured it out, and wouldn’t now walk across the street to see Springsteen perform if he was doing a free show in a mall parking lot.

Chris Christie is trying to save New Jersey from the financial implosion politicians before him set in motion. If Springsteen wants more money to go to the impoverished in his state, maybe he’ll put his money where his mouth is and start paying all the taxes he could be paying on his little farm there.

Until then, his rudimentary op-eds will continue to provide Larry Hagman with some degree of cover, as laughter shifts from the loon who thinks solar power will cure the world’s ills to disgust toward the hypocrite who’s calling the rest of us to a standard he’s not prepared to meet.

Baseball Crank:

When New Jersey’s Republican governor, Chris Christie, was sworn into office, he chose to celebrate at his inauguration by joining a Bruce Springsteen cover band in singing the Boss’ signature anthem, ‘Born to Run’. Governor Christie hails from Bruce’s home state of New Jersey, and his zealous Springsteen fandom is perhaps unusually dedicated for a politician. But it also symbolizes a paradox: while Springsteen has long been open about his left-wing political views and has hit the campaign trail for the last two Democratic presidential candidates, he remains enduringly popular with a broad segment of conservatives and Republicans. In part, that’s for the obvious reason: Bruce is a rock legend with a ton of fans, so we should be unsurprised that he would have fans of every political persuasion. It’s also partly demographic; Bruce’s fans tend to be disproportionately white and, increasingly, older, and those are more conservative groups than the population at large. But my own anecdotal sense is that Bruce’s fanbase is – if anything – more conservative-leaning than you would explain by those factors alone, and certainly not markedly more liberal. Speaking as a conservative and a longtime Springsteen diehard, let me offer some theories as to why that is. This is not an essay dedicated to claiming Springsteen for the Right, or arguing that he’s unwittingly some sort of crypto-conservative, although I do note at a few points conservative themes in his writing and his life. Rather, my argument is that the things that appeal to fans of Bruce Springsteen and his music are, quite logically, most appealing to conservatives.

Generally, we conservatives have pretty low expectations, politically, for our pop-culture icons. We understand that most of them don’t agree with us on politics or policy. So, what we look for are artists who have some tolerance and respect for us, some themes in common with our worldview, and sometimes being one of the good guys on something. Bruce delivers on all counts.

(1) Decency

One of the principal complaints of conservatives about the culture is that it’s a sewer of indecency: too much sex, too much bad language, too much immorality of various kinds…in general, too much bombardment of the young and the unwilling with messages and imagery that subvert any effort to bring kids to maturity gradually, with the perspective of time.

Bruce may be a liberal, but on this count, he’s been one of the good guys for a very long time. People bring their kids to Springsteen concerts and play his albums in the car without worry; out of his vast catalog, I can count on one hand the number of Springsteen songs I have to censor from my kids, and none of them are his major hits (on Live in Dublin, you can hear an audible crowd reaction to the line in ‘Long Time Coming’ where Bruce uses the F word). Bruce deals in adult themes without forcing his listeners into adulthood. Contrast this to a self-identified Republican like Britney Spears, who launched her career as an icon of underage sexuality, sings about threesomes and has presented an ongoing reality-show-style trainwreck of a life offstage.

Much, much more here.

Here’s the gasbag, now, gasbagging:

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“We see it as an entrepreneurial bill – a bill that says to someone, if you want to be creative and be a musician or whatever, you can leave your work, focus on your talent, your skill, your passion, your aspirations because you will have health care.”

So, to put it plainly: If you want to play your guitar in the subway, no worries – we’ll supply your health care. If you want to join a death metal barbershop quartet that plays everything on a children’s xylophone- that’s cool too. If you want to freeze-dry your feces, jar it, and call it an indictment on the Bush regime, relax, you daring artist – we’ll pay for your pink eye.

This is EXACTLY the news our young Americans need. With health care a non-concern, they can now focus on their crappy folktronica ragacore techstep. I’m sure their parents will be pleased to know their kids will get a real job.

Look, it used to be that those who embarked on careers in the arts did so because the lifestyle rejected the idea of a safety net. The rest of those boring old farts can become accountants and lawyers – but not the creative soul! He’s leaving town with nothing but a guitar, the wind at his back, herpes in his future. But when he snubs his nose at the safe and the boring – he also snubs the benefits that come with it. That boring company he mocked happens to provide steady income and benefits.

Life on the road doesn’t. That’s why it’s called “life on the road.” Somehow I don’t remember Bruce Springsteen singing, “Tramps like us, baby we were born to stay on our parents’ policies as dependents until age 26.”

Although that sounds better than the original, if you ask me.

And if you disagree with me, you’re a racist homophobe who won’t boycott Arizona.

Tonight’s show puts the delight in delightfanstastic!

We’ve got

Andrew W.K.!

Steven Crowder!

Juliet Huddy!

and Slayer’s Kerry King!

Nowhere is this more apparent than the ridiculous, cynical remake of “We are the World,” an exercise that according to news accounts seemed less focused on assisting the people of Haiti than on stroking the egos of the pseudo-stars and future nobodies who did the yodeling.

The tiresome video (directed by the tiresome Paul Haggis) raises an important question – who the hell are these people?  I think one of them – the dude with the expensive clothes and dull stare – was Puff Diddley or P. Daddy or whatever idiotic moniker he’s using this week.  You know, there was a time when grown men used their given names instead of childish nicknames that are just emblems of the eternal adolescence that modern pop culture worships. 

Now, the original “We are the World” was itself nearly unlistenable, but that’s a matter of taste and reasonable people can disagree (I thought the British supergroup Band-Aid’s “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” was a much better song, though it shared “World’s” inexcusable refusal to confront the reason the Ethiopian drought turned into the Ethiopian famine – the cruelty and stupidity of its left wing government ).  However, at least most of the participants were people with track records of success.  You had Bruce Springsteen, Paul Simon, Billy Joel, Diana Ross, Bob Dylan, Dionne Warwick and a bunch of others.  Now, not all of them might have been your cup of tea – I’d rather pass a kidney stone made of broken glass than listen to the Boss – but you had at least heard of them.

Let’s review the crop of hit-making legends present at the recording of the remake:  Well, Barbra Streisand showed up.  She’s a real star, and her presence assures the buy-in of the middle-aged gay couple demographic.  There’s “will.i.am.”  Mr. am is a member of a group called the Black Eyed Peas.  I’ve also heard of them.  They suck.  And you’ve also got noted cannabis aficionado Snoop Dogg, who probably did it because he confused Haiti with Jamaica.

Also present were entities known as “Weezy,” “Drake,” and “Kanye West.”  I thought “Weezy” was Sherman Helmsley’s wife on The Jeffersons.  Apparently she’s gained some tats, some extra appendages and started rapping.  Drake sounds like a cool name for a private eye, but my guess is he’s a rapper too.  Apparently most “stars” today are rappers.  I have heard of this Kanye fellow – I think he blamed Hurricane Katrina on George Bush.  I bet he blames the earthquake on 43 as well – hell, apparently everything’s Bush’s fault anyway.

The news report on the recording session also raised more questions than it answered with sentences like:

Fifteen-year-old Canadian heartthrob Justin Bieber, who sang the opening line originally performed by Richie, joked that he would ask his new friend, R&B singer Akon, to get the telephone number of Nicole Scherzinger of the Pussycat Dolls.

I know who Lionel Ritchie is, and I know what Canada is.  Other than that, these words make no sense when placed in that sequence.

We can sum up the whole thing with another sentence from the same news story:  “Randy Phillips, one of the organizers, said his ‘one regret’ was the absence of dance-pop star Lady Gaga.”

How lame is any endeavor where the absence of Lady Gaga makes it worse?

The point isn’t that charity is bad.  USA for Africa generated tens of millions and hopefully it was well spent.  To the extent this generates money that is neither squandered nor diverted into the pockets of thugs, good.  The point is not that these singers are somehow wrong for using their talents, such as they are, to assist others in emergencies – we should all do so when disasters happen.

The point is that in 25 years the concept of celebrity has degenerated into parody.  Borderline cretins with fake boobs and bulging wallets wander the streets of Los Angeles pursued by hordes of shutter-clicking parasites in self-reinforcing cycle of publicity whetting the appetite for more publicity.  Glance about the magazines at the supermarket check-out line – consider yourself on the cutting edge of pop culture if one face in ten makes an impression.  You have some NBC reality star’s heartbreaking split from a dude who plays a brooding werewolf on the CW while a breasty gal from a show on MTV beckons from the cover of Cosmo, promising to disclose her patented sex tips – tips that can probably be summed up with the words “Anyone, anytime, anywhere that might help my career in any way.”

The original “We are the World” was an event; this one is a mere occurrence.  And the reasons are not hard to see.  We have celebrities who do not deserve celebration.  We have a public grown weary of the shameless antics and craven pandering of the celebrity culture.  Who actually believes that most of the participants want anything more from this recording session than a close-up on Entertainment Tonight before they slink back across to the far side of the velvet rope? 

Or perhaps this really isn’t a just another ploy designed to feed the fame machine.  Maybe these “stars” do care about the people of Haiti.  After all, if there’s one thing that the name “Snoop Dogg” is synonymous with, it’s caring about others.

Six years later and it is clear that the Super Bowl’s organizers are still terrified of Janet Jackson’s nipple, that it comes to them at night and haunts them in their sleep, threatening to embroil them in scandal and to lose them millions in sponsorship deals. For what else can explain the entertainment decisions made by the Masters of the Bowl ever since that fateful Sunday afternoon in February 2004? 

Let’s take a look at who has played in the years since: 

2005 Paul McCartney (Age: 67) 

The less talented half of the Beatles songwriting team, more famous these days for his disastrous marriage to one-legged model Heather Mills. After spending years trying to promote his lackluster solo work he now dedicates most of his live shows to his 1960s catalogue, and has thus become a tribute act to his younger self. Not that he’s bitter or anything. 

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2006 The Rolling Stones (Collective age: 260+) 

This once great ‘dangerous’ band, notorious for their decadent lifestyles and provocative antics, have long since been reduced to a semi-parodic tribute act to their younger selves. Their drummer is a skeleton with a few wisps of hair attached to his skull. Mick Jagger made a mockery of himself by accepting a knighthood after launching a sustained whining campaign in the aftermath of “Sir” Paul McCartney’s own ennobling. Then Keith Richards fell out of a tree. 

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2007 Prince (Age 51) 

A spring chicken by super bowl standards (he was only 49 the year he performed), it’s been a long time since Prince thrilled, or indeed, entertained anybody. Furthermore, his performance at the Super Bowl came after he had joined the Jehovah’s Witnesses and stopped playing his more scandalous songs.  

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2008 Tom Petty (Age: 59) 

Past it, middle of the road rocker whose interest in music began when he met Elvis aged 10: not exactly cutting edge, then. Is he a self-tribute act? I don’t know because like millions of others, I just don’t care. But I do note that he reformed his original band Mudcrutch in 2008 to pay homage to his younger self. 

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2009 Bruce Springsteen (Age: 60) 

Past it, tedious, ultra-earnest screecher who recently won a prize for a song about a tired old wrestler. Even Springsteen admitted re: the Superbowl: “…if we don’t do it now, what are we waiting for? I want to do it while I’m alive.” I suppose Springsteen at least still tries to stay vital, and many music critics have responded to his more recent efforts by kindly pretending to like them almost as much as the albums he recorded 20-30 years ago.  

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2010 The Who (Pete Townshend 64/Roger Daltrey 65/Keith Moon- dead/John Entwistle-dead) 

This year, clearly fearing that they were running out of heritage rock acts to hire, the Super Bowl organizers invited The Who to perform. Now I don’t mind a bit of The Who, they were definitely good about 40 years ago, possibly even still good 35 years ago around the time I was born, but ever since… well Who Cares? As they have only released one new record in several centuries they are perhaps the ultimate self-tribute band, not even interested in trying new things. Yawn. 

So it seems that the rules if you want to perform at the Superbowl post- Janet Jackson are:

1. No breasts, and thus no women
2. If you are a man, then you must have a prescription for Cialis. 

Now before anybody accuses me of ageism let me say this: I have nothing against venerable singers and guitarists, etc. A month or so back on this very site I sang the praises of King Crimson, who are very old indeed, if not exactly Super Bowl material. Johnny Cash did some of his best work in his 60s and 70s, although again I can’t imagine all that Rick Rubin produced death gospel going down all that well with the sponsors. Some people claim Dylan is still good, and although I’m not a huge Dylan fan, I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. (I have grave reservations about Neil Young, however.) But there’s a difference between being old and vital and being The Who, or the Stones, or Paul McCartney. And while these acts can be entertaining enough even though they lost their mojo decades ago, too much heritage rock is a fairly awful, depressing, suffocating experience.   

I’m also a bit suspicious that these geriatric Super Bowl acts are those bands much beloved of the dismal late 60s Baby Boomer generation that has had a death grip on Western culture since the 80s at least, forcing its own nostalgia for a long passed youth down everybody else’s gullet. These coots just won’t let go: ‘Teenage Wasteland’ indeed. It’s enough to make you nostalgic for Janet Jackson’s nipple.

Brooks is a superstar pundit.  A featured journalist at The Weekly Standard, in 2000 Brooks was author of “Bobos in Paradise,” a smart look at “bourgeois bohemians,” the educated, “counterculture” crowd that had become America’s new blue state power elite.  Brooks went on to occupy the house conservative Op Ed position at the liberal mainstay New York Times and the equivalent chair on PBS NewsHour’s version of crossfire, with ever-apologetic Brooks pitted against the always garrulous lefty Mark Shields.  These two roles established Brooks as the left’s favorite conservative, a position he solidified as one of the Obamacons, prominent conservatives who supported Obama, believing him to be a moderate centrist, or in Brooks’ case, even a closet Burkean conservative. 

Last week Brooks went with his 15-year-old daughter to see a Springsteen concert in Baltimore and witnessed her joyous astonishment.  Her arrival at utter abandon echoed the exhilaration, the emotional learning, Springsteen had long ago imparted to Brooks, the depiction of a world of “teenage couples out on a desperate lark, workers struggling as the mills close down, and drifters on the wrong side of the law,” tales told with a jolt for “10,000 people in a state of utter abandon.”   

Brooks fondly describes the artistry and stories of Springsteen’s universe, “a distinct map of reality” seen on an epic and anthemic scale, in which “losers” always retain dignity and their choices have immense moral consequences, with emotions like stoicism, seen through veils of exaltation and nostalgia.  

Brooks also contemplates the artist, Springsteen himself, elusive, but for Brooks revealed by the “embarrassed half-giggle he falls into when talking about himself,” which Brooks reads as a humble de-emphasis of his own individual contributions in favor of the various musical traditions he presents. 

Brooks’ view is both charmingly personal and astonishingly superficial. It should occur to Brooks that the epic, anthemic performance he celebrates, through veils of exaltation and nostalgia, is a brilliantly constructed and much polished reach toward the mythological.  The desperate teenagers, laid-off mill workers, lawbreaking drifters are less the real folks of Springsteen’s life or American history than the figures of 60’s counterculture mythology, all of whom stand in, like Bonnie and Clyde, for alienated middle class adolescents searching for an identity.  

In an affectionate but clear-eyed analysis of the Springsteen show, Slate’s Stephen Metcalf has described this map of reality as “Faux Americana,” “a middle class fantasy of white, working class authenticity,” which Metcalf wisely attributes to Jon Landau, Springsteen’s producer, manager, and “full-service Svengali.” Landau, graduate of Brandeis and veteran of the 60’s Boston political scene, ‘discovered’ Springsteen, famously declaring, “I have seen rock and roll’s future and its name is Bruce Springsteen,” echoing left-wing journalist Lincoln Steffens 1921 remark after visiting the Soviet Union, “I have seen the future, and it works.”  Springsteen’s own politics have been decidedly left-wing: “I was politicized by the 60’s,” he has observed, and has supported John Kerry, anti-nuke, pro-Sandinista, Amnesty International, and MoveOn campaigns.   

The ‘Bruce’ David Brooks celebrates is not just the self-effacing voice of our musical traditions.  After all, in the rock pantheon he is ‘the Boss.’ Rather, the concerts are fully dramatized and choreographed presentations of Springsteen as the everyman oracle of this mythology, bourn on Wagnerian walls of sound.  Metcalf observes, the persona is constructed, “a majestic American simpleton with a generic heartland twang,” a much refined invention, all “po-faced mythic resonance that now accompanies Bruce’s every move.” 

The fanciful working class authenticity is key, the basis of the Boss’ claim on what Brooks sees as immense moral authority.  Brooks quotes Landau, that there is “not a lot of irony” in Bruce’s work, which, if you have any critical distance from the fabricated character, attendant mythology, and anthemic music, is dead wrong, Otherwise, you are Metcalf’s “rock and roll naïf,” and Landau is a circus huckster.  

Springsteen is not alone in constructing a persona, with its own mythology, claiming an imagined authenticity.  Many among the cast of characters of the 60’s counterculture, including rock stars, were in fact middle class kids who remade their own histories and identities, which is okay so long as 40 years after Woodstock and Altamont you mention to your impressionable 15-year old kid, this is show business, these are not the real gods, this is not your real history. 

But this is not likely among the blue-state elites.  Rather, it is likely that Brooks’ daughter will, at an elite university, be taught a map of reality rather close to the Boss’ faux Americana.  This is only too cruel, as it is also likely that today’s 15-year-olds will be asked to be stoical, to pay for all the mischief, all the self-serving boomer schemes, financial and otherwise.