A Fashionable Crowd Meets Away From Fashion Week

For some it's fashion week. For others, it's film party week. A screening at the Tribeca Grand Hotel, followed by a party at the SoHo Grand Hotel, took place Tuesday for the Groundwell Productions release "Appaloosa," organized by Andrew Saffir's Cinema Society and Vanity Fair magazine. The film is a Western based on a novel by Robert Parker, directed by and starring Ed Harris and featuring Jeremy Irons, Viggo Mortensen, and Renée Zellweger.

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Elle Macpherson

Guests included Alfre Woodard, Julian Schanbel, Chip Kidd, Elijah Wood, David Zinczenko, Tiffany Dubin, and Patricia Clarkson: the kind of unpredictable crowd that might turn up in a wild West saloon. Except here, they were served Champagne and a buffet of fried chicken, spare ribs, creamed spinach, and macaroni and cheese — could there be more proof that this was not a fashion party?

And here's a good New York story: Two actresses I photographed kindly told me they weren't "stars or anything." But they were some of the brightest creatures at the party. They are Jessica Love and Christina Moore, seniors at Juilliard who will both have parts in their school's production this year of "Dancing at Lughnasa" by Brian Friel. They got their invite to party through Ms. Moore's friendship with Robert Knott, who co-wrote the screenplay for "Appaloosa" with Mr. Harris. "He's like a second dad to me," Ms. Moore said. "His son and I were high school sweethearts," she added. That would be Gabriel Marantz, who has a part in "Appaloosa."