An Awards Nightcap

After losing to “Argo” writer Chris Terrio at the Writers Guild Awards Sunday night, “Silver Linings Playbook” writer-director David O. Russell still came out a winner in Hollywood.

Russell picked up a “Director of the Year” Award at the L.A., Italia Film Festival, which took place at the rechristened TCL Chinese Theatre (formerly Grauman’s).

For any as-yet undecided Academy voters watching the clock, Russell’s appearance came only hours before Oscars voting closes Tuesday at 5 p.m.

Al Pacino joined Russell at the festival, picking up the inaugural Jack Valenti - Legend Award, a tribute to the late former MPAA president. Larry King, fresh off presenting duties at the “Streamy Awards” earlier in the day presented to Pacino.

Scheduling issues kept Robert De Niro and Jennifer Lawrence away from picking up their respective Actor and Actress of the Year awards on Sunday night, but just-off-the-plane-from-New York Harvey Weinstein accepted on their behalf.

Talent manager Rick Nicita, Martha De Laurentiis (above right, with Russell), and Mark Canton steer the eighth edition of the L.A. Italia festival, which coincides with Oscar week.

Continuing past the Academy’s voting deadline and into Oscar weekend, the festival is a bookend to the premature “Hollywood Film Awards” that blasted statues [4]on sometimes unfinished and largely unscreened films at the dawn of awards season back on Oct. 22.

Kathryn Bigelow, Mark Boal and Jessica Chastain in the Backstage Creations retreat at the WGAs on Sunday. Chastain put on her writer’s cap, taking a moment to pen a handwritten note of encouragement to a patient of the International Foundation for Research and Education on Depression.

Hilfiger: Be My Valentine

If designer Tommy Hilfiger has a British professional Doppelganger, it is TopShop “proprietor” Sir Philip Green.

The tale of the tape shows an even match: “Retail tycoons,” as the British papers call Green? Check for Hilfiger as well.

Daughters who starred on loosely scripted glamorous life reality shows? Check.

(Hilfiger’s daughter Ally’s “Rich Girls” was ahead of the curve on MTV in 2003. Green’s daughter Chloe turned in a season on “Made in Chelsea,” the addictive and posh U.K. equivalent of “The Hills” that recently arrived stateside on the Style network.)

Competing opening parties across the street from each other on Robertson this week? Check.

In a show of good sportsmanship, the two made a phone call and decided to support each other as their events went head to head on Wednesday night.

(Above, the two arrive at Cecconi's, where black cabs lined the driveway)

At Hilfiger’s afterparty, Axl Rose emerged from hiding to sing (barely, I’m told). There’s no photos, but not because Rose smashed the house photographer’s camera; InStyle has the exclusive.

The Six-Degrees of Ryan Seacrest: Randy Jackson, Derek Hough, Kim Kardashian, and Kris Jenner surround the man that has showered success their ways.

The night before Topshop’s Topman store opened at the Grove, the launch party at Cecconi’s was as congested as the Grove is between Thanksgiving and New Year’s. So much so, that Jennifer Lopez’s security armada had to do a pre-sweep of the arrival hallway.

Lionel Richie and Will.i.Am, who had just parted from a power-circle with Randy Jackson in J.Lo’s landing zone.

Londoner Russell Brand (above, left) knows the Oxford Street flagship well. Miranda Cosgrove grabbed traditional British soft serve inside (where waiters hawked “chips “in newspaper with vinegar and Colman’s mustard). Emma Roberts and Evan Peters, and Chris Brown (whose matching ensemble says he’s “all heart”) were just a few of the big gets.

Paris Hilton, her onetime publicist Elliot Mintz, a handful of Jonas Brothers, singer Estelle, philanthropist Nancy Davis, her son Brandon (no longer greasy-bear) Davis, and “Anything Can Happen” singer Ellie Goulding also turned up.

Solange Knowles, whose party relevancy has spiked during the current Beyonce-surge,  performed. (“I never get to play a party like this, where people actually dance,” she said after her set.)

Keeping it in the family, before they reunited at the Super Bowl, Destiny’s Child reportedly played Greene’s son’s Bar Mitzvah party several years ago.

Sure, Demi Lovato played the consumer opening, but still, this is the crowd for a "store" opening. Suffering from crowd-envy: "Extra."

Not just a party guy, Greene himself was manning the front door of the swarming two-story store Friday afternoon, landline phone in hand, and assistant at his side.

Welcomed by the style community, Steve Madden, Jen Rade (Angelina Jolie’s stylist and “leg” culprit) and  Nicole Scherzinger were amongst the VIP preview shoppers.

Inside, Greene welcomed Scherzinger with a hug as she arrived. Scherzinger is currently hot in the U.K. after a breakout season back at the judges’ table on “The X Factor UK.”

Getting to the space catty-cornered across from Marmalade should be easier for at least a few of the boldfacers. The preview shoppers all got a special VIP Card for free valet parking at the Grove for a year.

Longoria Earns her "Traveler" Wings

Minnie Driver and Conde Nast’s Melissa Smith. New Yorkers Daniel Bendict and the Cinema Society’s Andrew Saffir sandwich Naomi Watts at Conde Nast Traveler’s celebration of the Leading Hotels of the World on Feb 13.

Eva Longoria jetted in from the New York Stock Exchange to Mr. C’s in Beverly Hills on Wednesday night, making it in time for Conde Nast Traveler’s awards season party.

Longoria spent the first part of the day on the NYSE floor in lower Manhattan for a Lay’s promotional appearance, delivering the electric defibrillation to the off-season for the junk food industry  -- the presumable lull brought on by post-Super-Bowl binging remorse.

Celebrating the 85th Anniversary of the Leading Hotels of the World, the partnership took advantage of the synchronized anniversary of the 85th Academy Awards next weekend, making it a film-themed party on the under-utilized 12th floor salon of the south Beverly Hills hotel. 

Beyond Best Actress nominee Watts, Minnie Driver and Michelle Monaghan, Conde Nast’s Gaia Filicori (below, left) has the strongest personal and professional connection to the Best Picture race. 

Conde Nast’s own link to Oscar season, Gaia Filicori, Eva Longoria, and Leading Hotels’ Jennifer Oberstein.

Filicori quit her previous media job to join the four-person casting team that waded through thousands to find Best Actress nominee Quvenzhané Wallis, She stayed on for two years and worked through production with longtime friend and "Beasts" director Benh Zeitlin.

Horse trading DVDs from the gift bags in the elevator on the way down proved last year's "Midnight in Paris" to be the choice disc over the liberally distributed "Scent of a Woman" and "Ocean's 11."