SUNDANCE REWIND: The ‘It’ Factor

The festival rolls on in Park City for a few more days, with Billy Bob Thornton and Tea Leoni coming to town to promote their film “Manure,” (couldn’t they come up with a more appealing title?) and the MySpace Café  (where they have facebooked blocked) open for a few more days, but for me, after day five, my fifth trip to the Sundance Film Festival has come to an end.

Reflecting on my Sundance that was:

HIGHLIGHTS:

-Ewan McGregor. Wow. There are some stars who have that ‘It” movie star quality and it took a face-to-face encounter with Ewan to realize that he is definitely part of the club that I think possess it. When I’d interviewed Bruce Willis and Ben Affleck in this past (and Ben this trip again), it was immediately apparent they had ‘it.’ I’ve decided that the common equation that results in these stars all possessing the ‘it’ factor, apart from whatever they do on-screen and even their attractiveness is…

When they walk into a room, you can’t miss them. They exude confidence bordering on cockiness leveraged with a thick dose of charm. They’re articulate, passionate, look into your eyes when they’re speaking to you with an intensity bordering on intimidation but balanced with warm, almost smirking smiles.

I caught up with Ewan on the red carpet for the Ray-Ban Visionary Awards presented by the Creative Coalition at the ASCAP Music Lounge during Sundance where he was supporting “I Love You Phillip Morris, “ a film where he and Jim Carrey play each other’s love interests. I asked if he’d had a good repertoire with Jim prior to playing his gay lover and he said they’d never met prior but were now good friends.

I asked if he planned anymore great adventures like his round-the-world motorcycle trips that have resulted in a television series and couple of books and he said that for the foreseeable future he’s sticking to his greatest artistic love, film. He said of his motorcycle adventures, “They’re kind of experiences of a lifetime so I don’t want to use them all up. You want to be hungry for them,” adding, “I don’t want to be on a trip wishing I wasn’t. I much rather be wishing I was on a trip when I was not on one.”

After our encounter I ran down Main Street to Chefdance, an annual week of celeb-chef prepared dinner parties hosted by my friend, chef (and Real Housewives of New York City star) Bethenny Frankel. The night I went Simon LA chef Kerry Simon was the chef du jour. Bethenny told me the night was so in demand “I had to tell Pierce Brosnan (another star with the ‘it’ factor) that he couldn’t bring all his guests and could only have +1. Woody Harrelson was there too. When I walked passed his table it smelled like funny cigarettes. I wanted to ask him what made him marry the mother of his three children after 20 years of dating, but I didn’t have the chance.  I got distracted when when Camp Freddy’s Billy Morrison decided to make use of the camera situated facing an empty stage and filled the empty screens hanging around the dining rooms by mooning everyone. That was it for the TVs.

STAT: Five days, total sleep: 21 hours. To put in perspective, my normal required 8 hours/night would have resulted in 40 hours.

Gotta love Sundance…Back with more highlights and stats tomorrow – after eight hours sleep ;) xo