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John Rocks Top Oscars Bash As Belle Of All Parties

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: February 26, 2008

With Vanity Fair sitting out this year's celebrations, the belle of the Oscars parties was a piano-playing Elton John.

The 60-year-old singer's 16th annual viewing dinner and after-party benefiting the Elton John AIDS Foundation topped other bashes Sunday, with 750 guests and a bevy of A-list stars who sipped cocktails and feasted on a four-course meal under the Pacific Design Center's red-draped tent.

Vanity Fair's lavish, celebrity-drenched annual affair, typically the top Oscar-night party, was canceled weeks earlier, before the end of the writers strike.

After greeting each table, John pounded out the first of 11 songs, the first time in several years that he has played a full set with an entire band at his own party.

John, who wore an ornate Yohji Yamamoto black suit, silver tie and black-framed eyeglasses, pointed at the crowd and banged on his piano. The crowd howled and clapped when he broke out hits such as "Rocket Man" and "Tiny Dancer."

Patricia Clarkson waved her arms in the air. Calista Flockhart swayed next to beau Harrison Ford. Petra Nemcova jumped on a few chairs and shimmied. Faye Dunaway bopped her head.

Mary J. Blige sang a duet with John, as did Scissor Sisters frontman Jake Shears, clad in a neon yellow-green suit, who jumped on John's piano and did the twist.

The party's second-biggest belle of the evening was Marion Cotillard. Clutching her best actress trophy for "La Vie en Rose," she swept into the bash, rushing past reporters and bear-hugging her family and friends inside the party.

"I am a big fan of hers. I was very moved by her win," a teary-eyed Sharon Stone, wearing a white, tailored tuxedo, told The Associated Press earlier, when the room's dozens of enormous TV screens showed Cotillard tearfully receiving the honor.

Actors gushing over other actors continued throughout the festivities.

Sean Penn, who snagged a best-actor win for 2003's "Mystic River," called this year's winner, Daniel Day-Lewis, "the greatest actor ever recorded on film." Lewis won for his performance in "There Will Be Blood."

Ellen DeGeneres, seated next to Portia de Rossi and Josh Groban, said Oscar host Jon Stewart was "doing a great job."

DeGeneres, who hosted last year's Oscars, joked: "It's better to host. It goes faster."

Jamie Lynn Spears Has Diploma, Friend Says

Out of the spotlight after revealing her pregnancy, 16-year-old Jamie Lynn Spears is moving ahead with her life, passing the GED test and thinking about college, a family friend told People magazine.

The "Zoey 101" star passed her high school equivalency exam about a month ago - scoring particularly well on reading comprehension - and is looking to take the ACT college entrance test, the friend says.

"She's already got her diploma," according to the friend. "She wants to take her ACT. She's not wasting any time. People don't know her. When she gets something in her head, she'll make it happen. Everybody is so supportive of her."

Today's Birthdays

Singer Fats Domino is 80. Political columnist Robert Novak is 77. Singer Michael Bolton is 55. Singer Erykah Badu is 37. Rhythm-and-blues singer Kyle Norman (Jagged Edge) is 33. Rhythm-and-blues singer Corinne Bailey Rae is 29. Actress Taylor Dooley is 15.

Sources: The Associated Press, People.com

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