party report

Golden Globes Party Timeline: The Who, What, Where, and When

Woody Harrelson, Tom Cruise, Katie Holmes, and Ben Stiller at the the New York Times T Style Magazine’s party Friday night.

To viewers, the Golden Globes are three hours of Hollywood self-congratulation and pretty awesome Mel Gibson jokes. To celebrities, they’re a whole weekend of self-congratulation! New York was there — here’s what we saw and heard between 7:30 p.m. (Pacific time) on Friday (a grumpy Joan Collins) and 11:30 p.m. last night (a glam Grace Jones buddying up with Chloe Sevigny).

Friday, January 15
7:30 p.m.: Golden Globes weekend begins at the New York Times T Style Magazine’s pre-Globes party at the Chateau Marmont. Joan Collins starts off the night smiling and chatting with Shirley McClaine. Less than forty minutes later, she leaves, looking grumpy and fending off photographers.

8:45 p.m.: Chloe Sevigny and artist-filmmaker Liz Goldwyn show up wearing matching tomato-hued lipstick. “We like to dress in tandem for these things,” notes Goldwyn. Sevigny, an eventual winner for supporting actress for Big Love, says she was in bed when she heard she was in the running: “I saw all the lights flashing and the text messages coming in, and at first I was scared. Then I realized it was a good thing.”

10:15 p.m.: Outside on the smoking deck, Eli Roth, who has been collecting phone numbers all night, somehow works through the pain of his sea urchin attack and canoodles with an unidentified blond woman in a blue dress. “You should come hang out later,” he whispers.

8:57 p.m.: “That place was flu city!” says Shirley MacLaine as she squeezes her way out of the packed room.

9:05 p.m.: Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes miraculously make it past the now-closed door, and the room immediately collapses in on them as every fan and “industry” member present asks for a photo. They refuse no one. (Chris Klein, who is wandering through the party alone, does not approach them.) Holmes holes up in a corner and proceeds to have a lengthy, animated chat with Glee’s Dianna Agron, who earlier had said, “Celebrity parties are seriously fun, but I don’t know how used to them I’m getting. There are some very important people in this room and I’m a very small fish in this pond.” Cruise later joins.

10:15 p.m.: Outside on the smoking deck, Eli Roth, who has been collecting phone numbers all night, somehow works through the pain of his sea urchin attack and canoodles with an unidentified blond woman in a blue dress. “You should come hang out later,” he whispers.

10:25 p.m.: TomKat makes their way out of the party, but not before being stopped by a very enthusiastic Ben Stiller. Cruise and Holmes look genuinely interested in what Stiller has to say.

7:18 p.m.: Over at the Art of Elysium benefit, Shepard Fairey talks Jeffrey Deitch’s recent appointment as director of MOCA in Los Angeles. How does he feel about a gallery owner — someone on art’s commercial side — running a museum? “I think that’s probably the more realistic approach … people end up telling you what’s good by what they’re willing to lay down their dough for. Of course I also believe in art with the highest aspirations, non-commercial.”

Saturday, January 16
3:45 p.m.: Day two starts with the BAFTA/LA Awards Season Tea Party at the Beverly Hills Hilton. We meet the “mean guy from Avatar” (as his publicist calls him) — Stephen Lang. He has a thick New Yawk accent (he’s from Queens) an is wearing a Miami Vice-style outfit: t-shirt with a jacket and some strong yet pleasant cologne. He tells us his run in Avatar has been “stunning and surreal.”

4:00 p.m.: We spot Quentin Tarantino leaving early. He’s so sweaty that he looks like he just stepped out of a shower.

4:10 p.m.: Rick Springfield arrives on the red carpet, to equal parts confusion and fascination.

4:45 p.m.: Soon after Gabourey Sidibe’s fashionably late arrival, we spy Jason Reitman and Paul McCartney leaving early; Reitman is being told by a friend that she’s not so sick that she can’t hug him. He demurs and heads for the valet.

6:20 p.m.: Over at the 35th Annual Los Angeles Film Critics Circle Awards in Century City, the mood is relaxed; all the awards were announced in December. Early arriver Jeremy Renner of The Hurt Locker chokes up as soon as he starts talking about the reactions he’s gotten from Iraq War veterans who’ve seen the movie. “Unfortunately, they say ‘thank you,’ but that’s what I’m trying to say to them,” he says. “I don’t really want to get into it because it’s really heavy and it makes me cry every time I talk about it, but it shapes who I am as a man.”

6:35 p.m.: Christoph Waltz stops by, gushes about working with Quentin Tarantino. “Quentin’s movies are decisive moments in film history. Maybe you can dodge them, but that would be your loss.”

6:45 p.m.: Mo’Nique has an ear-to-ear grin as she makes her way down the carpet, her husband-manager affecting the demeanor of a button-lipped bodyguard standing beside her. Does she get approached more since Precious? “I don’t want to sound vain at all, but I’ve been in this business for over twenty years so the approaching in the street didn’t just start yesterday.”

7:18 p.m.: Over at the Art of Elysium benefit, Shepard Fairey talks Jeffrey Deitch’s recent appointment as director of MOCA in Los Angeles. How does he feel about a gallery owner — someone on art’s commercial side — running a museum? “I think that’s probably the more realistic approach … people end up telling you what’s good by what they’re willing to lay down their dough for. Of course I also believe in art with the highest aspirations, non-commercial.”

7:20 p.m.: Ben Silverman waltzes into the event with new fiancé Jennifer Cuoco, and waltzes away from us as soon as we ask for his thoughts on what’s happening with NBC late night. “I think they’re all great people and I think it’s too bad. It’s insane. That’s my only comment.”

Sunday, January 16
8:04 p.m.: Guests file out of the Golden Globes auditorium in the Beverly Hills Hilton and into parties hosted at the hotel by HBO, the Weinstein Company, and InStyle/Warner Bros. Mickey Rourke is the first to arrive at the Weinstein Company’s fete. He’s wearing a three-piece suit with alligator skin lapels and has a very leggy blonde on his arm. His assessment of the night: Ricky Gervais was “funny,” but he “didn’t drink enough.”

8:24 p.m.: A somber-seeming Harvey Weinstein enters his own party soon after Kate Hudson, Joshua Jackson, Diane Kruger and the Edge — who’s raving about how funny he thought Ricky Gervais was — scurry by. How is Harvey going to adjust his Oscars push given the rather poor outcomes for Inglourious Basterds, A Single Man, and Nine at the Globes? “We’ll see,” he says. “You know, I think the Oscars and the Golden Globes sometimes are the same. Sometimes they’re different. We’ll see what happens. I’m pleased. We had a lot of fun tonight.”

9:02 p.m.: Arriving at InStyle/Warner Bros. Gabourey Sidibe trips, but doesn’t fall, over her dress. With a quick, “Oh, shit!” she heads straight inside.

9:30 p.m.: Amanda Seyfried shows up at HBO and admits she missed the show. When asked what charities she’s working with for Haiti releif she says, “I heard tonight there was a lot of stuff going on, but I haven’t really looked into it either, because I’m an asshole. But I’m gonna give a bunch of money.”

9:35 p.m.: BJ Novak, at the Weinstein party, comments on Ricky Gervais’s hosting skills, deadpanning, “Never been a fan. Don’t get it. Don’t find him funny. I think someone should Americanize that for a broader audience.” Seriously though, he did like the bit about Mel Gibson. “I think it’s sometimes the job of a comedian to go too far, and I think [Gervais] went just too far enough.”

9:42 p.m.: Coming out of the bathroom at InStyle/Warner Bros, Diana Ramirez of Heroes, in a Dolce & Gabbana gown, announces, “I have to pick my wedgie!” Then gracefully reaches behind her dress and takes care of the situation.

10:07 p.m.: The scene at the NBC Universal party is dead. Their only winner, Alec Baldwin, didn’t show at the Globes at all. Steve Carrell didn’t bother to come to the party (though Jon Hamm, Tina Fey, and Jenna Fisher did). George Lucas leaves after ten minutes. Even Nick Cannon, who was broadcasting a live after-show party from there, bolts as soon as he’s done.

11:30 p.m.: Grace Jones, who is wearing a hat that looks like the rings of Saturn, buddies up with Chloe Sevigny at HBO. As they wander off together, we imagine the secrets of downtown New York that they’re sharing.

Golden Globes Party Timeline: The Who, What, Where, and When