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Phoenix Rises at Theater Bookers' Party 

It was a friendly and funny Joaquin Phoenix who wandered into yesterday's Motion Picture Club luncheon at the Marriott Marquis Hotel. The Oscar-nominated star of Gladiator and Quills arrived with his girlfriend, Topaz, a lovely young South African woman who is neither a model nor an actress. (She is, however, something of a ringer for Gwyneth Paltrow.) He was not what you might call "dressed up," but he was ready for action.

"Where are we?" he asked me. 

In fact, Phoenix had shown up at the invitation of star-of-tomorrow Casey Affleck, who dates Joaquin's sister, Summer. Casey and Summer took seats on the dais. Joaquin declined. "I get sick if I sit on a dais. Ask my doctor."

Instead, the loyal pal and Topaz sat through the entire 2-and-a-half-hour proceeding at the same table with actress Lena Olin, whose husband director Lasse Hallstrom won Best Director. Phoenix clapped enthusiastically, and quipped away — he has a vicious sense of humor only partially seen so far on film — as he learned about the immense hidden power of the theater bookers who comprise the organization. 

Phoenix was particularly bemused when Casey Affleck, lacking someone to introduce him, did the honors himself. "I've known Casey since we worked on To Die for together," said Affleck. Some of the audience didn't seem sure of what was happening. "Those three Oscar nominations, they meant nothing to me, but to Casey …" 

Eventually, Affleck accepted his own award and sat down. He gets high marks for trying to make the best of a dreary New York afternoon.

Hallstrom, collecting a much-deserved accolade after making The Cider House Rules, Chocolat and The Shipping News in three years, was very pleased. "I can't think of a better year to win this," he said. "I'm very proud of the film I made [Shipping News] and I'd like more people to see it. I worked on it for five years." 

He and Olin will now take a much-needed rest in Vermont. Then Hallstrom will decide which movie to make next: The Cinderella Man, with Russell Crowe, or The Conspiracy of Paper, a thriller. He and Olin told me they are looking furiously for a film they can do together, and would like to shoot something in Europe next if possible. 

(Olin — sexy and beautiful — also has a sense of humor. She exclaimed of the room temperature, "It's so cold in here." When someone responded, "Aren't you from Sweden?" she replied, "Yes, and you see I'm not there!") 

Other award winners included Producer of the Year Doug Wick, and newcomer Agnes Bruckner, who's about to be in several films. Actor of the Year British Ian McKellen told the very funny John Cameron Mitchell, star of Hedwig and the Angry Inch, "You're the boy that I never was."