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Date Posted: 12:34:09 11/16/04 Tue
Author: DAVID BRUSER/ENTERTAINMENT REPORTER
Subject: Press Junkets: Real reason for the hype
In reply to: by Nicolette Beharie 's message, "The ethics of press junkets in the entertainment world" on 12:20:24 11/16/04 Tue

Junkets: Real reason for the hype
Big studios can't resist media horde Small films must fight for attention

DAVID BRUSER/ENTERTAINMENT REPORTER

"So I asked Jeremy Irons ..."

"There was a line from Michael Caine ..."

"I like Nicole. She's sweet."

These and other cozy name-drops come from junket reporters sitting around a table at the Park Hyatt awaiting the arrival of the cast from Hotel Rwanda.

United Artists is hosting this junket, one of at least nine put on by studios during the Toronto International Film Festival. While the film's screening is an official TIFF event, the press junket isn't. What may seem like a part of the festival is actually studio-run and has its own lingo, rules and cast of characters.

It also has its controversial side, with some complaining that Hollywood press junkets distract from the smaller films presented by the festival each year.

Big studios regularly arrange for TV, newspaper, magazine and internet reporters to go to movie-promotion junkets and put them up at expensive hotels, usually in New York and Los Angeles, but often in Hawaii, Las Vegas and other exotic locations. And with more than 750 accredited entertainment journalists of all stripes in Toronto for the film festival, it's too good an opportunity for the studios to pass up. The same thing happens at the Cannes and Sundance festivals.

Some reporters are in Toronto this week just to cover the junkets — never mind the city, the hundreds of movies showing and the viewing public, said print reporter Jay Stone, who is covering the festival.

"There might be people who fly in just for (one junket) and then leave," he said. "I know people who don't even know what city they're in. `Oh look, grey squirrels' — that's what they say about Toronto."

Junket reporters fall into two categories: POWs, or "pay own way;" and junketeers, also dubbed "junket whores" by some POWs because the studios provide them with airfare, hotel rooms and sometimes other goodies in exchange for coverage, hopefully promotional.

Pointing across the table, an American POW reporter whispers, "He's a junket whore. They know where to sit, who to sit with. Sometimes the stars will reach over and touch them."

Paul Fischer, a writer for the website Dark Horizons who said he sometimes attends junkets on the studios' dime, sits right beside the star if he can. Publicists lean the back of one chair against the table so the star knows where to sit, and at the Park Hyatt, Fischer finds an empty chair adjacent.

Fischer's a junket veteran and knows the allotted 20 minutes with each star is never enough. As soon as Don Cheadle sits, Fischer starts in.

"I know how to ask my questions," he said after.

The pace of questions is relentless. Stumbling over each other to get theirs heard, reporters often drown out the last few words of Cheadle's answers.

The problem with a reporter on the studio dole is that he is watched closely by his benefactors and expected to avoid prickly questions, said Stone.

Fischer, a Los Angeles resident dubbed the "L.A. junket man" by his website, mostly works in California and New York but every year attends the Sundance and Toronto fests.

"You're there to help promote the movie and try to get an interview of the person," he said. "You are more or less beholden to a degree. You have to be careful. (But) there were times when I would do a junket and the actress was two hours late and I knew why she was late. I did write about it. That may upset a few people, but on the other hand, I believe that actors should be as professional as journalists."

On this day, radio, online and print reporters occupy roundtables in four rooms. The Hotel Rwanda notables, including Cheadle, Nick Nolte and Sophie Okonedo, will visit each room, spending 20 minutes with a pack of six to 10 reporters.

Toward the end of each 20-minute session, a publicist wearing a headset and carrying a clipboard enters, says, "Last question," and looms to make sure the star can escape the peppering.

At Fischer and Stone's roundtable, the main interest is Cheadle, who appears in all but one scene of Hotel Rwanda. Nevertheless, many questions have nothing to do with the movie, film festival or Toronto but other projects, such as Cheadle's role in the Ocean's 11 sequel Ocean's 12.

Not as famous, glamorous and presumably not as interesting to readers, the entrance of script writer Keir Pearson and director Terry George prompts some reporters to click off their tape recorders.

"Next they'll start giving us the catering people," Fischer quipped later.

Though they might detract attention from the festival's lower-profile films, junkets bring in mega-stars whose presence boosts the profile of the festival as a whole, Stone said.

"There's all sorts of controversy about Hollywood taking over the film festival. But that's what everybody wants."

Some of that controversy stemmed from last year's festival when some junkets reportedly piggy-backed on the media juggernaut in place to promote films not even in the festival.

During this year's festival, as usual, some film companies and publicists are taking advantage of the press corps gathered in the city for their own ends. Earlier this week, for instance, The Recorded Picture Company and Capri Films invited media to a press conference introducing the star of a film that has not yet been made. Then there was the Dubai International Film Festival promotional event at the Windsor Arms Hotel that included camels, belly dancers and a falcon.

But the publicity seekers ultimately help the city and its festival, said former TIFF executive director Helga Stephenson.

"That's the bifurcated world of the festival — you have industry and press on the one hand and the public on the other," she said. "The festival has always worked hard to protect the public. But it's a very major part of the business of film and the natural law (for studios) is to go for the biggest markets possible."

And considering the ever-increasing cost of film production, it makes sense for studios to take advantage of a massive gathering of reporters who could potentially spread a good word, Stephenson added.

But Stephenson said the studios must also pay attention to the Toronto viewing public.

"Sometimes the reaction of the Toronto public will alter an advertising campaign," she said. "You can't manufacture that, you can't replace it, you can't invent it. It's the great power of Toronto."

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