Hello all you U.S. bound people (can you hear my tone of scorn?)
I am here in Cannes for that little festival they throw in May. Every year, I come here and practice rolling my eyes and looking at everyone with disdain – you know, I practice my French. Good times. We (Alexis and I) got here on Monday evening, just in time to throw a party for our illustrious plebians, converts, students, in the Filmmaker Program at the American Pavilion. We literally came, partied, and fell directly asleep. Now if that’s not a good party, I don’t know what is. The amazing thing is, we walked along the street Monday night, at about 11pm, and the streets were completely deserted. It was the calm before the storm.
Now that we’re here and the festival has finally started. No longer are there streets with no one on them. Our apartment overlooks a cute couple of restaurants; and Monday was the last night when we had a quiet night of sleep. The hordes (and a similarly named group) have now descended upon the streets of Cannes.
For those of you who think we’re just lounging around in luxury, we have started our program of roundtable discussions for the students. In order to really give the 150 film students from across the country who pay for the priviledge of waiting tables at the American Pavilion an education, we ask industry executives to come in and talk with the students – giving them insight and the benefit of their years of experience. So far, they’ve met with producers who specialize in financing (Deborah Zipser) and an exec. at Warner Independent (Lauren Craniotes). The students have been thrilled (I had to escort Lauren out to get the students to release her). Still to come, Trevor Groth, programmer of Sundance FF and programmer/founder of CineVegas, Brett Ratner (duh, the director) and Mr. Robert Duvall(!). I hope these kids appreciate all that we’re doing for them. If so, I expect a package to appear at my table at the AmPav, wrapped in brown paper, filled with Euros in denominations of 10’s and 20’s. Or, at least, a promise to take me when they managed to get invited to all the cool parties that I would simply read about the next day in the Variety.
More later, gotta run and get a good seat in order to hear (make eye contact and seduce with my brain waves) Norah Jones when she comes in to cut the red ribbon on the American Pavilion.
really, good times.