By Alla Byrne
Sunday January 08, 2012 10:15 AM EST
Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt
Steve Granitz/WireImage
What's
Brad Pitt's newest accessory?
A cane – and it's not just for show.
The actor, 48, walked the red carpet at the 23nd annual Palm
Springs Film Festival awards gala with the cane on Saturday, and told
reporters he has
an injured ACL, a ligament in the knee that connects the femur with the tibia.
"I was carrying my daughter [Vivienne] down the hill and I slipped," Pitt said. "It was either her or me."
Though Pitt says he won't need surgery, he may need that cane for a while.
Not that his partner,
Angelina Jolie, minds.
"I like the cane," she told reporters on the carpet Saturday,
adding that the injury hasn't slowed him down much at all. "He's not
that kind of guy. He does everything still."
Jolie also said that Vivienne, 3½, wasn't hurt in the tumble.
"Vivie's okay," she told reporters. "She was absolutely fine."
•
Reporting by SCOTT HUVER
January 8, 2012, 11:28 am
By BROOKS BARNES
PALM SPRINGS, Calif. — The glass trophies were designed by
Dale Chihuly.
The appetizer was diced green beans and carrots. A press advisory had
warned that after 4 p.m. “no media will be allowed to use the
bathrooms.”
I had an uneasy feeling about this.
So it’s not the
Golden Globes. Or the
Screen Actors Guild Awards.
Or even the … well, you get the idea. But the Palm Springs
International Film Society’s annual prize dinner, held Saturday night
here in a bedazzled convention hall, has nonetheless become a major stop
in the annual campaign for little gold men.
Chris Pizzello/Associated PressAngelina Jolie and Brad Pitt at the gala on Saturday.
Held while ballots for Oscar nominations are still out, the Palm
Springs awards are considered crucial for the fingers-on-the-ledge
contingency — solid Academy Awards contenders but those who could still
stand to pick up a few more votes from the older showbiz types who have
decamped to the desert.
So the crowd from “Young Adult” was there –
Charlize Theron and Patton Oswalt, Jason Reitman and Diablo Cody — to collect the creative ensemble prize.
Glenn Close
accepted the Career Achievement Chihuly while pitching “Albert Nobbs.”
Gary Oldman, snubbed by the Screen Actors Guild, accepted the
International Star Award for “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.”
Palm
Springs, partly because it announces the winners of its awards ahead of
time, draws a megawatt crowd. Among the A-listers this year were
Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt and George Clooney. Mr. Pitt and Mr. Clooney
were both given trophies for their work.
(Mr. Pitt and Ms. Jolie,
guarded by a team of private security operatives, politely put up with
nonstop pawing from attendees armed with camera phones during the
four-hour dinner. “I’ve never seen such rudeness,” said Robert Stafford,
a Palm Springs retiree seated at a nearby table. “Let those poor people
eat their green bean salad in peace.”)
The event, hosted by the
ever-chirpy Mary Hart, raised $1.6 million for the Palm Springs
International Film Society. The convention center, decorated with every
purple tulip west of Rotterdam (some 14,000 in total), was packed with
1,900 guests, who ate a dinner of short ribs atop a hash brown patty.
Octavia Spencer,
picking up the Breakthrough Performance Award for her feisty maid in
“The Help,” kicked off the evening with an emotional acceptance speech
capped with a joke about the producers of the film, which centers on
black maids in the 1960s. She said that a higher power “sent me two
white knights — very, very white.”
Michel Hazanavicius, who accepted the Sony Bono Visionary Award for writing and directing
“The Artist,”
gave a gracious speech thanking the society. “I don’t know who you
are, but thank you very much,” he concluded. (He’s French — cut him some
slack.)
And
Mr. Oldman,
who drew a standing ovation from parts of the room, was equally
gracious, thanking the society for focusing attention on his espionage
drama. “And, of course, for my Chihuly,” he said.
Brad Pitt is still
walking with that cane.
But being injured is worth it if it means his children are OK...
Pitt told reporters at last night's Palm Springs International
Film Festival gala that he hurt himself when he took a fall while
carrying daughter
Vivienne.
Angelina Jolie said it's not the first injury of its kind at the Jolie-Pitt household.
"When [
Maddox] was younger, I took a fall and
cracked my elbow because I wanted to make sure he didn't have the
fall," Jolie said. "Every parent has injured themselves. Every parent
will stand in the line of fire for their kids so it's a normal thing."
Jolie said Pitt isn't milking the injury at home. "He's not that kind of guy," she said. "He does everything still."
"I'm proud of him every single day," Jolie said of her hubby,
who last night was presented the Desert Palm Achievement Award by his
Moneyball costar
Jonah Hill.
Jolie told me she's likely to direct again after making her debut earlier this year with
In The Land of Blood and Honey.
"It's such a weird thing. I sat down to try to write something and I
can't even believe it's become a film," she said. "I do have a pile
of things I haven't shown anybody, including one on Afghanistan."
PHOTOS: 2012 Palm Springs Film Fest
READ: How Many Glasses of Champagne Will Be Poured at the Golden Globes?
By:
MIKE CIDONI LENNOX |
01/08/12 1:14 PM
AP Entertainment Writer
George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie and other red-carpet veterans
joined some Hollywood newcomers in the Southern California desert this
weekend to kick off the two-month-long movie award season at the Palm
Springs International Film Festival.
"When you're of age: drink," Clooney noted to the newbies
at Saturday night's gala awards ceremony. "That's good advice to pretty
much anybody."
Among those relative newcomers were Clooney's co-stars
from the drama "The Descendants." ''It is the first time we have dressed
up all season," said actor Matthew Lillard. "We have a couple months to
put on nice dresses and suits."
"Don't forget the shoes," injected actress Judy Greer. "Oh
man, am I going to need a massage when the next two months are over."
Clooney, star of both "Descendants" and the drama "The
Ides of March," was given the festival's "Chairman's Award" for acting,
directing, producing and writing. "They gave me a gavel on the way in,"
he joked. "And I'm feeling like I might actually get protested now."
Among other honorees: actresses Michelle Williams ("My
Week with Marilyn), Jessica Chastain and Octavia Spencer ("The Help")
and Glenn Close ("Albert Nobbs").
Pitt was handed the Desert Palm Achievement Award for his
performances in "Moneyball" and "The Tree of Life." Gary Oldman
("Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy") was dubbed International Star of the
Year - the significance of which seemed to baffle its recipient.
"I am on an international stage, rather than a local one," Oldman noted. "I guess that is what that means?
Or perhaps he simply no longer needs a passport.
"Who designed the award?" Oldman asked. "Maybe I have just that and it gets me through customs."
As excited as Jolie was to support partner Pitt — the
latter walking with a cane, following a skiing injury — home in LA was
where their hearts were. "We are rushing back to the kids tonight,"
Jolie explained. "We have a birthday party in the morning with our
daughter."
Next stops on the entertainment honors gauntlet include
Wednesday's People's Choice, Thursday's Critic's Choice, Friday's Los
Angeles Film Critics and Sunday's Golden Globes awards.
"I found that the last time I was (at the Golden Globes),
it was a very fun day," said actor and director Kenneth Branagh, a Globe
nominee for his performance in "My Week With Marilyn."
"The fact that it is a smallish room by comparison with
some of the bigger awards rooms means that it has an intimacy and a kind
of slightly raucous quality that is very, very carefully adhered to,"
Branagh explained. "I was very intoxicated."
By Andrea Mandell, USA TODAY
PALM SPRINGS, Calif.
–
It's going to be a fun road to the Oscars this year.
"It's
quite a way to start," said Williams in the desert air, as a crowd of
fans cheered behind her. "It's pretty overwhelming, actually."
"It's a little like Cannes," mused
Gary Oldman on the red carpet, speaking against a backdrop of palm trees and mountains.
The evening was also an early chance to see what good-natured ribbing
Golden Globes
category-mates Pitt and Clooney had in store for each other. (Indeed,
Clooney referenced their two-time Sexiest Men Alive status from the
stage.)
"I'm just glad George is going to be around because there's no one more fun," said Pitt backstage, after
Jonah Hill, who flew in from the
East Coast for the evening, presented him with the Desert Palm Achievement award for his work in
Moneyball and
Tree of Life.
On the red carpet, Clooney, who arrived with girlfriend
Stacy Keibler, threw out some skepticism over Pitt's latest skiing injury, which resulted in a twisted knee and forced Pitt to arrive at
Palm Springs with a cane.
His
plan to thwart Pitt? "I don't have any great plans yet, but I'm going
to work on it. He's in a cast so he's already hobbled. He's going for
the sympathy vote," Clooney joked. Pitt's rebuttal? "Absolutely. I'm
going to work it for all I can get," grinned Pitt backstage. "By the
way, I told him that. He took my line."
Pre-show, Jolie arrived hand-in-hand with Pitt and was equally chatty, excited to bring her directorial debut In the Land of Blood and Honey
to screen in Washington soon. With both she and Pitt nominated for
Globes, does it change the awards experience for her? "It's fun either
way," she said. "It's fun when it's just one of us and it's fun when
you're (there as) a family."
Good spirits were
in abundance as awards were handed out. When Melissa McCarthy (who has
plenty of Oscar buzz for her performance in Bridesmaids), arrived, she admitted to her own fan moment.
"I'm geeking out a little," said McCarthy. "We just saw The Artist and we just saw the lead actors pass. I literally gasped."
Meanwhile, Tom Hanks, who presented the director of the year award to his
Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close director
Stephen Daldry,
was hoping to find a former co-star. "I've gotta find Charlize at some
point because I cast her in a movie I directed about 16 years ago called
That Thing You Do," he said.
Later, Clooney, accepting his chairman's award for his work in The Descendents and The Ides of March, spoke of his love of his job, a sentiment echoed by many who took the stage that night.
Octavia Spencer grew emotional accepting her breakthrough performance award for
The Help, speaking of her 16-year journey to the Palm Springs stage. And prolific newcomer
Jessica Chastain shed a few tears after
Al Pacino, who cast her in her first film, presented her with the Spotlight Award, calling her a "prodigy."
But there were cracks, of course.
Onstage
Williams disclosed that when she was starting out, an agent tried to
persuade her to change her name to Michelle Montana. "Or Michelle
Montaigne. I always think I came this close to a career as a porn star,"
she joked.
And Spencer threw a line out to
her fellow male award winners. "I'd be remiss if I didn't say — I'm
single, gentlemen," she grinned from the podium.
Before Jeff Goldblum presented
Glenn Close with the career achievement award, she spoke on the red carpet of bringing her indie film
Albert Nobbs
to life. "I struggled all those years and suddenly it seemed like it
was the right time and it started to take on a life of its own,' she
said. "I'm just so proud and wonderfully relieved and (have) a great
sense of closure."
Kenneth Branagh, who presented Williams with the desert palm achievement award for
My Week with Marilyn,
discussed why the film, in which he plays Sir Laurence Olivier, has
struck a chord with audiences. "It appeared to be one thing on the
surface, a kind of biopic in miniature, but in practice it was quite a
revealing piece about celebrity and about what you might call the price
of fame," he said.
Meanwhile, before
Patton Oswalt accepted the vangaurd award for creative ensemble (presented by Olivia Wilde) for
Young Adult with Theron, director
Jason Reitman and screenwriter
Diablo Cody,
he marveled that "a major studio put out a movie that was — it wasn't
even that the movie was so dark, it was that it was not trying to get
the audience to love it. And because of that it becomes more
fascinating. For a studio to get behind that, especially these days,
it's kind of miraculous."
Oldman also shared some news about his latest hit, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. A second installment, he says, based on John le Carré's third novel Smiley's People,
is in talks after the success of the film. "It's an artistic endeavor,
and it's an indie movie, but it's actually making money," he said.
"People are seeing this movie and that makes me very proud."
With the Globes only a week away, many of the stars said they were excited.
"I
love this time of year, I love it," said Spencer. "I love getting all
the magazines and flipping through and seeing who thought what was the
best (dress). And now I'm a little worried!"
Clooney planned on bringing Keibler, and has no qualms with the no-holds-barred returning host
Ricky Gervais.
"I
really like him, he makes me laugh," Clooney said. Plus, "It's always a
fun show because everybody gets a little smashed, so you never know
what they'll say."
4:51 PM PST 1/8/2012 by Jane Kellogg
