Best supporting act
The countdown has begun for this year's Oscars ceremony, but for the star-studded event's caterers the planning has been going on all year. This time, however, they will be operating from a new purpose-built venue. Gillian Drummond reports.
It bagan in 1958 with a post-Oscars banquet for 250 in the Hollywood Roosevelt hotel. Today, the Governor's Ball, the official party of the Academy Awards, with its sit-down meal and entertainment for 1,650 people, has become one of the biggest and hottest parties of Oscars night.
The man behind the feeding of Hollywood's most talented is Wolfgang Puck. The owner of restaurants such as Spago, Granita and Chinois, and an event caterer, author and TV star, Puck is as much of a celebrity as the guests he is catering for. With seven Governor's Balls already under his belt, Puck is now something of a veteran. But when the stars come out this Sunday (24 March) for the 74th Academy Awards, he and his team of 700 are hoping things will run better than ever.
This year, for the first time, the ceremony will be held in its new permanent venue, the multi-level Kodak Theatre, part of a retail and entertainment complex called Hollywood & Highland, which opened in Los Angeles last November. The dinner will be held in the 25,000sq ft Grand Ballroom within the Renaissance Hollywood hotel, also part of the complex. It is leased by Puck directly from Hollywood & Highland's owner, TrizecHahn Development Corporation.
Because the venue was purpose-built for the Academy Awards, Puck helped in the design of the kitchens and the ballroom, which features 35ft high ceilings, floor-to-ceiling windows and wraparound outdoor pre-function terraces.
Carl Schuster, president of Wolfgang Puck Catering and Events (WPCE), says: "If there are any problems on Oscars night, it's our fault because we designed it all for this in mind." The countdown this week is the result of months of meetings for WPCE, beginning with a debriefing just weeks after last year's awards ceremony. Puck and his chef partners devise the menu, and some of his top restaurant chefs are flown in for the weekend from Chicago and Las Vegas to help.
Tables - custom-made this year to include tanks of live goldfish - will be laid on Friday and Saturday. Kitchen staff will spend Saturday butchering meat and preparing dessert - Puck's famous chocolate Oscars, mini replicas of the award statuettes and now a tradition at the ball. A crew will then work through the night preparing vegetables and poaching lobster.
The streets around the venue will be closed off to all traffic except limousines arriving for the ceremony, so catering workers, including 400 waiting staff, will be transported by bus to the venue and accompanied by security staff of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the movie-industry body which owns and stages the event. Once on the site, they won't be able to leave until the proceedings are over.
Schuster says that security gets tighter with each Oscars ceremony and, following the 11 September terrorist attacks, WPCE is leaving nothing to chance. Every worker involved in the day is subject to background checks by the academy.
The catering starts with a cocktail party from 3pm, when the stars begin making their way up the famous red carpet and into the Kodak Theatre. The party caters for all 3,500 people attending the ceremony (only half will go on to the ball), and for this Puck sticks to tray-passed hors d'oeuvres.
The food is prepared in a 1,200sq ft satellite kitchen off the main theatre, and in additional cold kitchens on the five levels of the theatre. There is also a built-in bar on each level and a total of 30 bartenders, 45 chefs, 120 waiters and eight to 10 "captains".
The awards ceremony begins at 5pm, giving the caterers three hours to prepare dinner. Schuster wears a headset and is in constant contact with the show's producers, who keep him informed of the running time. The ballroom team works from two kitchens, a main 8,000sq ft facility and a 2,000sq ft satellite kitchen.
There is no theme to this year's ball, as the organisers want to simply celebrate the new venue. Guests - to include nominees such as Russell Crowe, Dame Judi Dench and Nicole Kidman, host Whoopi Goldberg and presenters such as Tom Hanks and Gwyneth Paltrow - will arrive around 8pm and be served tray-passed hors d'oeuvres, including Puck's signature mini pizzas and cheeseburgers. There will follow a trio of salads - lobster, smoked salmon, and goats' cheese and asparagus - then a split-plate entr‚e of sesame-crusted salmon and New York steak with wasabi glaze. The vegetarian option, requested by 10% of guests, is Asian stir-fry with noodles.
With some people staying as little as 45 minutes and others until midnight, it has become impossible to have everyone eating at the same time. So the floor is split into four quadrants with a manager for each, and within that there are four or five captains, each with a section of six or eight tables and about 16 waiters.
Although the Oscars ceremony is just another business day for Puck and his team, the glamour and excitement can be overpowering, even for a company that deals with celebrities every day. "We do huge parties and premieres all the time, but this is 10 levels up as far as the energy goes," says Schuster. "In December, we catered at the premieres for Vanilla Sky, The Majestic and Ali three nights in a row in Los Angeles. But that was nothing like this. With the helicopters, police and stars, everyone gets a little distracted. You can't help just looking."
Staff can look, but if they're caught talking to the stars or asking for autographs, they're off the floor. Says Schuster: "We have a reputation for being all business."
New home for Oscars
The new permanent venue for the Academy Awards is part of the $615m (£432m) retail and entertainment complex Hollywood & Highland - so-called because it sits on the intersection of Hollywood Boulevard and Highland Avenue.
Like the rest of the complex, the 637-room Renaissance Hollywood hotel, managed by Marriott International, was designed with the Oscars in mind. Entertainment journalists and TV crews have taken block bookings, and 450 rooms are being filled by the academy itself, one by a security staff member who has been checking the venue and its surroundings for the past three weeks.
Other guests have been asked to remain in the hotel for the day, and there will be no check-ins on Sunday. Similarly, Hollywood & Highland's other eight restaurants (including celebrity chef Wolfgang Puck's newest venture, Verte) and 17 fast-food outlets must close for the day.
Wolfgang Puck Catering and Events
WPCE, the catering arm of celebrity chef Wolfgang Puck's business empire, has held the Oscars night contract for eight years.
President Carl Schuster refuses to reveal the value of the contract, but claims it's relatively small fry for the Los Angeles-based company, which brought in $16m (£11.23m) of revenue last year and caters for corporate parties and film premieres for as many as 4,000 people.
"It's a very small percentage [financially] but in terms of exposure it's about 75%," he says. "It's by far the most valuable party to us in that sense."
The new venue, with its guarantee of more awards ceremonies and premieres, looks set to be a major money-spinner, and WPCE is anticipating more than doubling its sales this year to $35m (£24.58m).
Governor's Ball shopping list
60lb of caviar
1,200 live goldfish
10,000 orchid blossoms
8,000 pieces of china
500 bottles of Champagne
2,000 bottles of wine
14,000 hors d'oeuvres
