Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers play American Airlines Center on September 26.
Photo courtesy of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
Iconic rockers Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers have been off the radar for a while now, but they'll be back in a big way soon. The band will stop by American Airlines Center in Dallas on Friday, September 26.
Petty and his band will be touring in support of their latest album, Hypnotic Eye, which is scheduled to be released on July 29. Steve Winwood will be a special guest on the tour.
The tour kicks off five days later in San Diego, eventually hitting 28 cities across North America through October 10. The only other Texas stop will be in Houston on September 25.
As a bonus, anyone who buys a ticket for any of the concerts will receive a copy of Hypnotic Eye. Members of Petty's Highway Companions Fan Club will also get a digital copy of an exclusive new live album, Live 2013, featuring 11 songs recorded during the Heartbreakers' 2013 Theatre residencies in New York and Los Angeles and at the most recent Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival.
Members of the fan club will also get to participate in a special pre-sale beginning on Tuesday, May 27. Tickets go on sale to the general public on Saturday, June 7.
This will be Petty's first concert in Dallas since 2010, when he played at the then-named Superpages.com Center as part of his Mojo Tour.
Of all the formulaic movie genres, Christmas/holiday movies are among the most predictable. No matter what the problem is that arises between family members, friends, or potential romantic partners, the stories in holiday movies are designed to give viewers a feel-good ending even if the majority of the movie makes you feel pretty bad.
That’s certainly the case in Oh. What. Fun., in which Michelle Pfeiffer plays Claire, an underappreciated mom living in Houston with her inattentive husband, Nick (Denis Leary). As the film begins, her three children are arriving back home for Christmas: The high-strung Channing (Felicity Jones) is married to the milquetoast Doug (Jason Schwartzman); the aloof Taylor (Chloë Grace Moretz) brings home yet another new girlfriend; and the perpetual child Sammy (Dominic Sessa) has just broken up with his girlfriend.
Each of the family members seems to be oblivious to everything Claire does for them, especially when it comes to what she really wants: For them to nominate her to win a trip to see a talk show in L.A. hosted by Zazzy Tims (Eva Longoria). When she accidentally gets left behind on a planned outing to see a show, Claire reaches her breaking point and — in a kind of Home Alone in reverse — she decides to drive across the country to get to the show herself.
Written and directed by Michael Showalter (The Idea of You), and co-written by Chandler Baker (who wrote the short story on which the film is based), the movie never establishes any kind of enjoyable rhythm. Each of the characters, including competitive neighbor Jeanne (Joan Chen), is assigned a character trait that becomes their entire personality, with none of them allowed to evolve into something deeper.
The filmmakers lean hard into the idea that Claire is a person who always puts her family first and receives very little in return, but the evidence presented in the story is sketchy at best. Every situation shown in the film is so superficial that tension barely exists, and the (over)reactions by Claire give her family members few opportunities to make up for their failings.
The most interesting part of the movie comes when Claire actually makes it to the Zazzy Sims show. Even though what happens there is just as unbelievable as anything else presented in the story, Showalter and Baker concoct a scene that allows Claire and others to fully express the central theme of the film, and for a few minutes the movie actually lives up to its title.
Pfeiffer, given her first leading role since 2020’s French Exit, is a somewhat manic presence, and her thick Texas accent and unnecessary voiceover don’t do her any favors. It seems weird to have such a strong supporting cast with almost nothing of substance to do, but almost all of them are wasted, including Danielle Brooks in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it cameo. The lone exception is Longoria, who is a blast in the few scenes she gets.
Oh. What. Fun. is far from the first movie to try and fail at becoming a new holiday classic, but the pedigree of Showalter and the cast make this dismal viewing experience extra disappointing. Ironically, overworked and underappreciated moms deserve a much better story than the one this movie delivers.
