The Art of the Junket

When you finish a film there are numerous duties thenceforth: appearances, publicity and distribution, to name just a few. So if you're lucky enough to have the reel stuff hit the fan, every studio and filmmaker needs that special place to hold... The Junket.

Carol Watkins, director of entertainment sales at the Four Seasons Beverly Hills, and Keith Iddis of Claridge's, London, might best be described as the royalty of the circuit, as they preside over the two main courts of all film business. With them - and the help of hundreds of caterers, servers, event coordinators, journalists, actors and executives - a movie can either be made or broken.

Four Seasons Beverly Hills

In a courtyard fit for Her Highness, Watkins sits unceremoniously. It's a regular day without so much as an inch of pomp or circumstance. The Queen gets right down to business.

"This hotel was built for junkets," Watkins proclaims. "Suite heavy, with a floor design perfect for media and privacy, there are over 100 suites with balconies offering open air and natural lighting. The key to a good junket is breathing room and comfort."

The Art of the Press Junket began much around the time Watkins appeared on the 90210 scene. In 1986, the year prior to the Four Seasons Beverly Hills launch, she already knew that her position would be aligned with the studios. Today, the industry shuffles the hotel its business and, it might also be said, gives the hotel its timeless Hollywood appeal: star-studded yet discreetly understated.

After all, filmmakers and studios need a place to demonstrate the breadth of their art, explain their purpose and further develop their image. And the press junket provided the star actors and visionary directors with the ability to speak to their craft, to demystify their great work or, alternatively, to add Tinseltown's quintessential eau de mystique.

 "I began running the junkets in 1989 as we realized that our property supplied a need to the industry. It was a major source of income, as well," Watkins reveals. "There was a certain pride that the staff embraced with each event, managing the crew and creating unique experiences that tied seamlessly into the films being marketed."

As a result, high-powered entertainment and junket design quickly developed. Executive Chef Ashley James developed theme buffets, providing French pastries for movies like Marie Antoinette or back-to-basics comfort foods appropriate to something more Southern. For Hairspray, the buffet-table cast list included colored cupcakes that mirrored the one sheet.

Recent films such as Blades of Glory allowed the Four Seasons to get creative, developing an ice-skating rink in the center of their Palm Garden. Thinking creepy? Four Seasons staff went so far as to fill the bathtubs of all junket suites for the film What Lies Beneath.

There was also the time they displayed Bumblebee and Optimus Prime peeking into the windows of the hospitality suite (during Transformers, of course). And the live anaconda during the, um, Anaconda junket. From the moment you stepped off the elevator during Constantine, the junket floor was set-designed as a dark "other worldly" experience; and for The Fast and Furious: Tokyo Drift, the Four Seasons garage was transformed for a photo shoot with the original cars used in the film.

Perhaps movie junket-dom's most memorable moment, however, was the time Matthew McConaughey drove up to the hotel in his RV for the Sahara junket and proceeded to cook burgers and steaks for staff and new arrivals.

There's no question the Four Seasons is, and has always been, a place for Hollywood hot-shots to dine, drink and deliver deals, but it is also a place to keep big names and juicy stories hush-hush. Ask The Four Seasons, or fellow partner in the junket circuit Claridge's in London, to name names, and they simply respond, "No can do." They demand privacy and, thus, respect it. Refusing to give journalists fickle, tabloid-worthy fodder, they've sworn to never tell a story or deliver up a guest unless the gossip is considered common knowledge (or pre-approved by the Director of Public Relations).

Watkins arranges junkets almost every week. Demanding? Yes, but when it comes to considering another profession, well, there's no chance she'll leave this one anytime soon. "My job is like taking a big jigsaw puzzle and putting the pieces together. It's different every day, and I love it!" Watkins exclaims.

Claridge's

If the Beverly Hills brigade is the regal matriarch, her counterpart is just a hop across the pond and a mere minutes' skip from the famous Bond Street. There the King, Claridge's, awaits to meet the media with marble floors and a genteel air that give a nod to past and present high-profile film gurus.

Welcome to one of London's best-kept upper-crust haunts and the home of London's press junket scene.

In 1812, when James Mivart opened his hotel in a house at 51 Brook Street, he designed the place for guests who wished to extend their stay in London rather than simply pass through. Apartments were let by the month, not the night. Mivart then joined up with other residences on the street, which included No. 49 Brook Street, a separate hotel run by William and Marianne Claridge, and thus was Claridge's conceived. A brand-new hotel joining the group of properties was designed by C.W. Stephens, and the property reopened in November of 1898.

We doubt Mitvart would have ever imagined that nobility, pop royalty and Hollywood entertainers would later call Claridge's their "home away from home" and that it would enjoy a reputation as a hub of European entertainment's high life.

As war raged across Europe, Claridge's also became the place for exiled royals. King Peter of Yugoslavia, exiled from his country in 1941, was notable among them, and his son, Crown Prince Alexander of Yugoslavia, was born in Suite 212 in July 1945.

In 1996, Claridge's embarked on its first major designer restoration since the 1930s, and David Collins [The Langham, The Berkeley, The Wolseley hotels] was invited to create a new cocktail bar. New York-based architect Thierry Despont [famous for his work for Conrad Black, Calvin Klein, Peter Morton and co.] was then brought in to re-design the foyer, and proceeded to create the famous "Gordon Ramsay at Claridge's."

The stage was set.

Spencer Tracy famously said, "I don't want to go to heaven; I want to go to Claridge's." Bianca Jagger and Marc Jacobs frequent the property for its well-mannered staff and timeless ambience, but any gossip on what, exactly, happens behind the scenes is - as with its patrician cousin in California - best left to the gossip hounds. Claridge's won't be talking.

What they will tell you is this...

Their list of junkets from 2005 and 2006 included Harry Potter, Miss Congeniality, House of Wax, V for Vendetta, Failure to Launch, Inside Man, Fun with Dick & Jane, Lady in the Water, Pirates of the Caribbean, Click, Marie Antoinette and Bobby.

However, if you really must know what happens beyond the bespoke doormen and courteous maids, you'll simply have to check in for yourself. Just tell them the princess of press junkets sent you.