The red carpet

Clint Eastwood, Sean Penn, Penelope Cruz, Josh Brolin, Mickey Rourke – these are some of the celebrities we saw on the red carpet (and on stage) during this year's Santa Barbara International Film Festival. R and I have been volunteering at and around the entrance to the biggest theater in town during the last couple of weeks. As a guy who is enthralled by Hollywood filmmaking and the entertainment industry in general, I really enjoyed having this glimpse into the realm of fame and experiencing first-hand the charisma of stars who are followed by a near-constant glow of flashbulbs.

As R put it, it was like watching TV without the editing. Stripped of that editing, you really get the chance to see the stars for who they really are. Eastwood was incredibly sharp during his on-stage interview/retrospective and shared some fascinating tidbits about acting and directing... and both at the same time. Cruz's interview was slightly less insightful, but she came across as very down-to-earth yet, of course, amazingly attractive. For some reason I liked the Rourke tribute best. The guy proves that you can become famous on talent alone. He was the least star-like of anybody: he misspoke a few times, disappeared from the stage whenever clips of his work were played (and didn't always make it back in time), and generally didn't appear comfortable with his fame. But the film clips they showed demonstrated an enormous talent for acting. See him in The Pledge or Sin City for an example, not the mention The Wrestler, for which I guarantee he wins the Oscar.

The volunteer work involved a lot of standing around but was pretty low stress and served to give us an up-close look at the ongoings. One night we tore tickets at the main entrance to the theater. Another night I functioned as a security guard (yeah, intimidating me), stopping patrons and people wanting a look from coming through a side entrance. It was funny to hear some of the reasons why people thought they should be let in, e.g. “I just had knee surgery; you can’t make me walk all the way around to the front.” The occasional VIP would laugh at me when I tried to stop him and say something like “Haha -- I’m in charge of this festival,” as he kept on walking. As an unpaid volunteer without proper training, I tended to give folks like that the benefit of the doubt and let them pass.

The unfortunate part of being a volunteer is that we were not allowed to carry a camera, so my photos from the events are limited. The picture above was taken on a night off as we were passing by the theater on our way to the bar. The guy there was about half way done replacing David Fincher (whose interview I missed) with Mickey Rourke on the marquee. On my last night of volunteering I did some pre-production set up, which meant I had time to go home and change out of my volunteer shirt and grab a camera before the tribute to Mr. Rourke started. There are a few pics from that event in this gallery, but I'll bring the one below to your attention. Do you recognize this childhood hero of mine?