A few weeks before the Academy Awards, I began to wonder, as seems to be the case every year, when I was going to nail down my plans for a potential watching party, soirée, or get-together. I’d thrown fêtes in past years, inviting folks over for pizza and burgers while stars quipped and cried, complained and celebrated. Since I moved to Los Angeles, however, from the last months of the previous year until their inevitable unveiling in March of the following one (or, in this case, February), the Oscars’ palpable buzz always hung heavy in the minds of everyone I knew.

So, the question remained, what could I possibly do to outrank the barn-burners of before?

Thankfully, the answer arrived in a fortuitously timed email sent from my esteemed FilmStew editor. “Any interest in attending the Night Of 100 Stars gala at the Beverly Hills Hotel?” read the invitation. “It could make for a good Beyond the Lens, especially if you can get quotes from what might amount to a dream Love Boat episode cast.” How could I refuse? The evening promised to be a star-studded affair right in the heart of Hollywood, with stars and celebrities aplenty, and most importantly, an opportunity to dress up and look good. Oh yeah, and there was an open bar, too.

So this past Sunday night - Oscar night - finally arrived, and I was giddy with the excitement of a debutante appearing at her first cotillion. My petticoats,  black suit was pressed and cleaned, and my shoes polished (if nothing else, I was determined to keep up with the stars’ fashion, if not aptitude for downing inhuman amounts of alcohol in one sitting).

I’d spoken to Ed Lozzi, who was in charge of press for the event, and he promised food, fun, and pin-drop silence during the telecast (“things go nuts during the commercial breaks,” he assured). I departed for the hotel with my girlfriend, who looked positively radiant in a floor-length nude-colored dress, gold heels and manicured make-up, and we made our way through the serpentine Hollywood hills to the impending bacchanal.

Despite a minor miscommunication at the press check-in (we were VIPs, as it turned out), we whisked down the red carpet while throngs of photographers and paparazzi snapped away at... well, I wish I could say it was me, but more likely it was Michael York, who casually conversed with reporters as he entered the hotel lobby.

Passing another throng of security checklists, we were granted easy admission to the ballroom, which rested at the end of a long antechamber that was perfect for stargazing, hobnobbing with celebs and generally tallying the famous faces that trafficked through the crowd.

In but two or three quick surveys of the ballroom foyer, I saw Henry Silva (who I’d watched not a day earlier in the original Ocean’s Eleven), Bud Cort (Harold & Maude), Sally Kellerman (M*A*S*H), Eddie Griffin (of Undercover Brother, here fully regaled with an entourage), Robert Wuhl (TV’s Arli$$), Leslie Ann Warren (The Limey), Amanda Detmer (Saving Silverman), Robert Costanzo (Alex & Emma) and Doris Roberts (Everybody Loves Raymond).

James Cromwell (Babe), the poor man, was being flanked by (I kid you not) Asian photographers who wanted snapshots of him in seemingly endless variations, and I watched as his smile evaporated into a weak grimace as the flashes descended repeatedly upon his genteel demeanor. Christopher Lloyd (Back to the Future), skillful as he was, didn’t quite escape the gauntlet, but sidled off after a few pictures and an autograph or two, taking his seat just as the ceremony began.

We found our seats and ordered another round of drinks from the indefatigable, dedicated wait staff, and wondered who might be joining us at table number 25. As it turned out, we were lodged between two very prominent Lous - Diamond Phillips and Ferrigno - and the two couldn’t have been different in demeanor. Ferrigno and his wife were the first to join the table, and sat quietly as Billy Crystal’s opening monologue unspooled to modest laughter from the crowd.

I nudged my girl to tell Lou he was the object of her schoolgirl crush some years back as the fearsome TV Hulk, but she refused, and I was left with the formidable task of making introductions.

Sadly, things didn’t quite pan out the way I intended. Telling him he scared the hell out of me as a little kid - which, quite frankly, at this moment he was doing again - didn’t seem to crack his quiet, authoritative facade, and he moved on to others at the table before the compliment escaped my lips. I later attempted again, to a similar rebuff, and chose to keep my comments - hell, my eye line – far from anywhere near his vicinity.

Lou Diamond Phillips, on the other hand, couldn’t have been nicer. After polite introductions (which he initiated), he and I traded quips while Crystal cracked wise, and made our relative observations of the nominees, presenters, and winners. After beseeching me to safe keep his martini while he excused himself for a “nicotine injection,” I decided I’d ask him something I’d always been curious about regarding the fickle flame of celebrity culture.

Perhaps because of witnessing Cromwell’s degradation, or more likely, because I’d made it to my fourth vodka tonic, I asked him if he - and by large, any celebrity - expects to be approached, photographed, or questioned whenever he goes to an event or function. His answer, unsurprisingly, was remarkably insightful. He explained that he usually went to events alone, meaning without “security,” and didn’t see the point of attending an event, or going to a club or restaurant, if it required a phalanx of accompanying guards to walk through the front door.

He said he’d been fortunate enough to have good experiences with people who’d approached him, and never felt like it was a burden of having a Hollywood career to communicate now and then with those who’d only seen him on the big screen. I drank to that (privately, that is; I was actually toasting passersby at that point), and watched him scurry off again for a cigarette as the ceremony went to its next commercial break (somewhere between the fortieth and fiftieth Oscars awarded to Return Of the King, I think).

As it turned out, the “break” proved much longer than the span of a few Tiger Woods spots. Instead, technical difficulties plagued the next forty or so minutes of the Gala, as the pixyish chairman Norby Sellers attempted to maintain order (“shhh- showtime!” he repeated intently) by introducing former Oscar winners or nominees in attendance (including Warren, Kellerman, Robert Forster and Robert Loggia).

Ferrigno, after polishing off two junior-sized side salads and a chicken entrée, made a swift departure from the ballroom, and we never saw him again. Phillips, sadly enough, didn’t stay long enough to see the Oscars reinstated on the wall-to-wall monitors, but graciously bid us adieu with a farewell worthy of a superstar (“I have a plane to catch”).

We also managed to track down John Corbett, who was there with his current flame Bo Derek, and shot a picture or two to make my girlfriend’s gal pals jealous, then watched the attendance slowly dwindle as the Oscars wound to a close.

Stepping out into the foyer for a last bit of stargazing, I got my own chance to approach a rising star: Jeffrey Ross, perhaps best know for his unforgettable roast of Hugh Hefner in 2001. I told him I thought he was very funny, and he said I had great taste. In a corner, Gary and Jake Busey were winding down an evening of debauchery (Gary sat on the stairwell, obstructing traffic), and David Carradine made a noble profile exiting quietly while the last revelers took advantage of what remnants of the open bar remained.

With Phillips’ words still ringing in my ears, I stepped back out onto the red carpet toward the valet stand, hoping someone might approach me for a comment or quote about the night’s goings-on (I’d been drinking, okay?). Alas, the photographers had long since scattered, and the only folks left standing beside me were my dedicated, decidedly more-sober girlfriend, and a host of other partygoers eagerly waiting for their shiny black SUVs to arrive.

When my car pulled up, I opened the door for my girlfriend, and in the passenger seat sat a dozen box of Krispy Kreme donuts, warm and ready to be eaten after a long night of boozing. Startled momentarily, I almost managed to get in the car before tearing the lid off the box and devouring donut after donut whole.

This isn’t dignified, I thought, shoving another ring of glazed fat into my mouth. Oh well, I rejoined, this is my night as a Hollywood insider, a VIP amongst the industry elite and I’m taking full advantage of it. I tossed the box in the back seat for a before-bed snack, and privately wondered what my paparazzi picture would look like.

Knowing my luck, it would be one of my girlfriend, sitting delicately in the seat of my unclean Jeep Cherokee, next to a frenzied man in a black suit stuffing donuts in his mouth like a real-life Homer Simpson.

The caption? “Shhh- Showtime!”, of course.

[Twice a month, Beyond The Lens examines the latest big screen trends and personalities responsible for them. To reach the author, please email mtgilchr@aol.com. Meanwhile, to comment on this week’s topic, please go to our Beyond Beyond The Lens Discussion Board.]