Five Dates with Hilary, Jodie, Rebecca, Calista and ... Cliff from 'Cheers'? at Hollywood.com

Movies Trailers TV DVD News Celebs Fan Sites

MyHollywood

Get Movie Showtimes & Tickets

Celebs

Photos

Fan Sites

Apply

Directory

Support

MyHollywood

Forums

Newsletter

Hot List

Take the Hollywood.com Survey and Win an iPod!

Hollywood.com's 2008 Summer Movie Preview

That Other Blog: Same Crap. Different Smell

Hollywood.com games! No registration, no downloads

Home

Celebs

Five Dates with Hilary, Jodie, Rebecca, Calista and ... Cliff from 'Cheers'?

By Scott Huver, Hollywood.com Staff

Hilary Swank

It’s only early November and our calendar was already filling up weeks before the party-heavy holiday season. But when your fellow party guests include Hilary Swank, Jodie Foster, Rebecca Romijn and Calista Flockhart, how could we send our regrets on any invitation? First up was an evening honoring Oscar winner Swank, where Hollywood.com’s Joel Stratte-McClure shared the inside story:

A Swank Soiree
Why was Hilary Swank the only award recipient at an elegant and intimate presentation at the Hotel Bel-Air on Thursday night? And what did she do to merit a prestigious Time for Peace Film and Music Award?

Turns out that the actress, attired in a black Christian Dior dress complemented by the charitable coif created by Oprah Winfrey, missed the official award presentation in Paris last June. That prompted the French organizers and a Swiss sponsor to host a cocktail party and gourmet dinner that included 50 Swank friends and virtually no other celebrities.

“This very special award is determined by a jury that includes 26 ambassadors to the United Nations and Hilary deserves to receive it in the best venue in LA with her chosen guests,” said Nice-born Robert Einbeck, who co-founded the Time for Peace Awards with his wife Marion in 1994. “Her inspirational performance in the extraordinary Freedom Writers embodies humanist values that promote tolerance and better understanding between people everywhere.”

He wasn’t the only fan. Freedom Writers writer/director Richard LaGravenese, who also directs Swank in next month’s comedy P.S., I Love You, sang her praises during a cocktail reception.

“This award illustrates that Freedom Writers, which is based on a true story and took me six years to make, had an impact in the real world beyond Long Beach,” said LaGravenese, who was accompanied by producer Stacy Sher. “It underlines that Hilary’s instincts were right when she insisted, years after we first discussed it, that she have a lead role that she felt would inspire students and teachers everywhere.”

The slender Swank, who donated over nine inches of her hair to the American Cancer Society last week, took it all in her athletic and compassionate stride.

Hilary Swank and Richard LaGravenese

“It’s delightful to give back and help others, whether it means cutting my hair for a woman in need or making a movie that confronts issues of inequality and injustice,” said Swank, wearing Neil Lane diamonds and carrying a Mary Norton bag. “Freedom Writers is an entertaining movie that talks about something really important and shows that one person can change things. And it’s great to be given an award that puts me in the distinguished company of past winners like Steven Spielberg and Ed Zwick.”

Then she entered the dining room and sat at the head table with LaGravenese, Sher, the Einbecks and presumed husband-to-be John Campisi. “There’s too much family in this room,” Swank joked loudly before LaGravenese took the stage and introduced his leading lady as “an artist, a woman and a spirit who embodies hope in every breath she takes.”

An emotional Swank, who spent a month alone in India to teach kids the alphabet after making Million Dollar Baby, brushed away a tear as she arrived at the podium. “I’m a wreck after all of the nice things you said, Richard,” an emotional Swank began. “And I want you to know that I love you and will work with you again and again without even reading the script.”

“I’m blessed that I was chosen to bring this inspiring story to life and join other giants in this industry who use the broad reach of films and music to confront social and political problems,” continued Swank, as she gently put the gargantuan award on the floor. “I definitely want to recognize Ellen Gruwell and the students for setting an example for us all and I’m proud to accept this award on their behalf.”

“As Freedom Writers demonstrates, it is well within our grasp to touch one person, to do one right thing, to let go of fear and to be compassionate,” Swank concluded. “All of us in our own small way can turn on a small light in a dark room and create brightness and hope.”

Rebecca Romijn
Salad with Romijn
When the Ladies Who Lunch are a delicious as Ugly Betty babes Rebecca Romijn and Becki Newton, our afternoon easily opened up. Rebecca was being feted at the W hotel’s NineThirty restaurant by Los Angeles Confidential Magazine--the high-society bible in Hollywood--for being their latest cover girl, and she showed up looking radiant in a sleek, curve-hugging black Bebe dress that seemed like it would barely leave room for lunch.

We shared a table with Rebecca and her pal Becki as well as the magazine’s editor-in-chief Andrew Stone, and reps from the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty for Animals, which was also celebrating its 50th anniversary. And Rebecca, who just celebrated her 35th birthday a few days earlier, dropped her jaw when, as lunch concluded, a large cake was wheeled out and the guests serenaded her with a chorus of “Happy Birthday.” The towering actress was tickled to see her cover shot captured in laser-printed frosting, and Becki snapped a cell phone shot of the cake before it became dessert.

Rebecca was already showing off a special b-day gift around her splendid neck: “Becki Newton actually bought me this little paw print necklace, which I thought was appropriate and in honor of the SPCA and I'm such a dog lover,” she told us. “I heard there are some puppies up for adoption today and I might get myself into trouble.”

Becki kew her choice of collar was perfect for her canine-crazy co-star. “I just know that she's a dog lover and I share that with her. I love animals and so it just seemed appropriate,” she said, noting that her pal seemed to have the glow of a newlywed even before her summer wedding to Jerry O'Connell. “She's a really joyous, happy person and she was before she got married as well. I think that she and Jerry are so great together. So she was already that amazing and happy and beautiful inside and out. I'm really happy for her.”

Jodie Foster
Shifting the Spotlight
Jodie Foster joined a group of fellow celebrities--including Sean Penn, Seth Rogen, James Woods and Rainn Wilson--to shine a spotlight on some of showbiz’s top behind-the-scenes talent at Hamilton timepieces and Hollywood Life’s Behind the Scenes Awards.

“Especially when you direct a film, you know that it takes 150 people’s talent and commitment and obsession in some ways to create this one voice,” Foster told us. “Hopefully it’s the voice of a director, the signature of a director. And it’s almost like they have different vocabulary words, different tools in order to express that story and you rely on that, especially for directors of photography because it’s mysterious to us. We don’t really know how to read the meter, we don’t really know what it’s going to look like. Our eyes aren’t really trained the way their's are. And it’s the last mysterious place, on a movie set.”

Foster presented an award to director of photography Philippe Rousselot, who shot her film The Brave One, and other honorees included director Jason Reitman, producer Jon Kilik, costume designer Colleen Atwood, production designer Mark Friedberg, cinematographer Philippe Rousselot, film editor Jay Cassidy, stunt choreographer Dan Bradley, and property master Doug Harlocker.

Also feted was writer-producer Judd Apatow, who told Hollywood.com he never expected any awards for penning Knocked Up. “When you make a movie where you see a baby exit a woman you don’t expect to be honored. So I’m very excited.” Ironically, just three hours prior to the ceremony his sister gave birth. He joked that she said she’d call him back in five minutes when she gave birth and someone in the audience said she was a lucky girl. He responded, “No, she’s not lucky, she just has an enormous vagina.”

Presenting the award to Apatow, Rogen noted “because of him I’m currently not carjacking all of you tonight.”

Calista Flockhart
A Peaceful, Easy Feeling
There’s clearly no “sibling” rivalry among the stars of the ABC drama Brothers and Sisters: Sally Field, Dave Annable, Emily VanCamp and Matthew Rhys turned out to support a cause very close to the heart of their co-star Calista Flockhart, who drafted Annable to help her co-host the 36th Annual Peace Over Violence Humanitarian Awards Dinner at the Beverly Hills Hotel.

Peace Over Violence is dedicated to providing aid and assistance to victims of domestic violence and Flockhart has long championed the organization. “They have so many services,” she told Hollywood.com. “They have a hotline, they have a whole educational system, they have a prevention, they have a crisis intervention, they have people to accompany you to court and to the hospitals. They just have this whole support system for the survivors that is incredible and they follow through…Tonight there's this new program called Be Strong, which is all about empowering young girls and it's all about prevention, which is the key.”

Making a sneaky appearance away from the red carpet was Calista’s beau Harrison Ford, who proved as adept at dodging photographers as Indiana Jones is at dodging boulders. Annable got a hearty backslap from Ford, but said secrets from the set of his latest collaboration with Steven Spielberg are harder to come by, even from his friend Calista. “I've tried, I've tried,” he said. “I've sent flowers to her, but nothing. I can't get anything out of her…I'm always trying to get information out but she's pretty tight lipped.”

George Lopez

Meanwhle, over at the Millennium Biltmore hotel in downtown L.A., comedian George Lopez had guests at the Diabetes Research Institute’s Smile for a Cure rolling in the aisles with a typically unfettered comedy routine. Andy Garcia, who served as the evening’s emcee, gave a poignant speech about his nephew and a dear childhood friend who both suffer with the disease, and we chatted with sitcom legend John Ratzenberger, whose son has Type 1 diabetes.

--Additional reporting by Andrea Simpson

Isn't It Time You Went Hollywood!®

Hollywood Media Corp
NASDAQ:HOLL