Tomorrow’s JFK-to -LAX flight leaves at 8:30 am, requiring a pre-dawn wakeup. A few errands to attend to when I hit town and then a 7 pm screening of Funny People , which I’m told is an in-and-out, up-and-down, 145-minute ahem thing. In a respectable/honorable way, some feel. (Universal guy to journalist friend: “It’s real, and some people don’t want real.”) Then then I’m driving down to San Diego and Comic-Con around 10 pm. I’ve rented a crappy little Craig’s List cottage with a futon on the floor.
There are all kinds of parties and events, and starting early is key. (I wonder what time the press room opens?) There’ll be a New Moon press conference at 9:30 am Thursday in a Gaslamp-area hotel. And I’ve already reported that I’m safely okay to attend the Avatar presentation, which happens Thursday afternoon from 3 pm to 4:125 pm. There’s an Entertainment Weekly poolside soiree around dinner hour. And a private little Peter Jackson gathering for 40 or so fans on Thursday night (9:30 pm to 11 pm) so the Great Genius can expound about District 9, The Lovely Bones, Tintin and The Hobbit . There’s also an Avatar gamer party going from 8pm to midnight.
The inside-the-big-hall events are well covered in this Luke Y. Thompson/ Deadline Hollywood Daily summary. I’m just going to play it like it lays. Expecting a lot of chit-chat, cruise-throughs, hey-ho’s, photos and videos. One trap I’m not going to fall into is partying too much in the evenings. I’m planning on filing in Starbucks for hours on end.
In any event, HE will be unrefreshed and all-but-dead starting tomorrow morning and lasting until God knows when tomorrow afternoon.