"I had exactly the same comment," agreed Eva Ziegler, the Austrian-born global brand leader of W Hotels Worldwide, whose brand-spankin' new 223-room, Gwathmey Siegel–designed W Hoboken sits directly across the river from Mr. Balazs' Standard. "I was in Hong Kong in January ... I look down here and I'm like, 'I've seen this before!' It's very similar."

With its "architecture that almost mirrors Manhattan," the new W Hoboken is essentially "an extension of New York," Ms. Ziegler told the Daily Transom with a clink of Champagne flutes, just prior to the hotel's boozy, packed-house opening party—er, "brand event"—on Thursday, April 23. (Ever the consummate hospitality professional, Ms. Ziegler had immediately switched glasses to ensure this reporter a slightly more generous pour. "I want to make sure you have the maximum pleasure," she said, laughing.)

"W is all about B and F versus F and B," the charming Ms. Ziegler noted, flipping the standard industry lingo for "food and beverage."

In the lobby bar, DJ Cassidy manned the turntables as a slinky blond model in a black cocktail frock spun round and round inside a giant, rotating martini glass emblazoned with the hotel chain's single-letter logo.

In the new restaurant, Zylo, operated by Michael Jordan business partner David Zadikoff's Cornerstone Restaurant Group, chef Troy Unruh prepared some 20,000 bites of food, using four separate kitchens, including two auxiliary sites.

Young real estate tycoons Matthew Moinian and Michael Shvo, developer and marketer, respectively, of the ginormous W Downtown Hotel & Residences at 123 Washington Street, made an appearance. (Mr. Moinian told the Daily Transom that crews were currently pouring the 48th floor of the 58-story tower.)

Outside on the red—er, black, sparkly carpet—Erin Lucas, co-star of MTV's The City, was getting a good feel for the windy New Jersey waterfront. "It's chilly!" said the lovely Ms. Lucas, sporting a vibrant multicolored dress and a pair of Louis Vuitton pumps. It was Ms. Lucas' first trip to Hoboken. "It's pretty!" she said.

Actresses AnnaLynne McCord and Shannen Doherty also turned out for the festivities. "Have you noticed how cute Hoboken is?" asked Ms. Doherty, also making her virgin visit to Jersey's scenic River Street. "'Cause I noticed it driving in. I'm absolutely amazed at how clean and amazing the riverfront is."

Ms. Doherty performed an admirable job in the role of celebrity shill. "No matter where you go in the world, when you're at the W, you're home," she told reporters.

And was she ever excited about the new W's nightlife offerings: "Of course! Like, Tenjune?! Hello?!"

Impresarios Mark Birnbaum and Eugene Remm, operators of the W Hoboken's 4,000-square-foot Chandelier Room nightspot, which offers some spectacular views of the Manhattan skyline, also operate the popular meatpacking district hot spot Tenjune. (Turns out, W Hoboken developers David and Michael Barry are also investors in Tenjune, as well as the duo's forthcoming revamp of the old Lotus club, set to reopen by the end of the summer.)

From meatpacking to Hoboken is no huge leap, Mr. Birnbaum noted: "Hoboken is 10 minutes from the West Village. Once you're out of the Holland Tunnel, it's five minutes. From my apartment in the West Village to the Upper East Side, to the Lower East Side, to Soho, it takes me about 20, 30 minutes. It takes me less time if not equal time to get here."

Giving the bridge-and-tunnel crowd a hip destination without having to actually cross any bridges or tunnels only makes sense amid the sluggish economic situation, Mr. Birnbaum told the Daily Transom: "In this economy, I love Hoboken, for the simple fact that there are so many people in the surrounding areas that are looking to maybe save some money wherever they can and it may just be cutting out the simple transportation to Manhattan and lesser price point on drinks."

Shortly after 10 p.m., party-goers crammed into the hotel's second-floor ballroom for a special guest performance by the actor and singer Jamie Foxx.

"Hoboken in the house!" he declared before launching into a short but sweet set of songs, including his trademark cover of Ray Charles' "I Got A Woman" intermixed with its inevitable Kanye West mutation "Golddigger," as well as his own recent hit "Blame It (on the Alcohol)."

"At the end," W's Ms. Zeigler told the Daily Transom, summing up the company's party-hard philosophy, "we try to create a world of 'wow' that is bigger than life, that is surprising, that is playful, you know, where you enjoy yourself, sit, party, flirt, that kind of thing."

Was she flirting? "Always," Ms. Zeigler said, laughing. "We just need to drink a big glass."

Today Curbed posted two items that spell trouble or progress, depending on your point of view. W Hotel's parent company Starwood is building a branch of its new Aloft brand on Frederick Douglass Bpulevard and 124th Street. Aloft Harlem is slated to open in June 2010 next to an old carriage house that perhaps not coincidentally was long-rumored to be the site of a W hotel before it was recently converted to lofts.

And if the 125th Street rezoning, a luxury boutique hotel chain, and Columbia's expansion were not enough to seal upper Manhattan's fate, brokers have coined a pretentiously trendy name to attract young people to the nabe: "SoCo."

"South of Columbia University is Hot. SOCO," reads a listing for a $349,000 studio on 103rd and Riverside Drive on Halstead Property's Web site.

We did not think anything could be worse than the SoHa moniker condo developers are pushing on Harlem, but maybe college students will be more receptive to the rebranding campaign for Morningside Heights.

And those 222 residential units will be marketed by Michael Shvo, as The Observer reported last week.

The entire release, including quotes from Mr. Moinian, Mr. Shvo and a W official, after the jump.

- John Koblin

W Hotels Puts the "W" Back in Wall Street with W New York-Downtown Hotel & Residences
W Hotels' Sixth Property in Manhattan Will Add Style and Substance to New York City's Most Important Revitalization

WHITE PLAINS, N.Y.--Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc. announces the continued expansion of W Hotels with an agreement with New York-based real estate developer Moinian Group to operate the W New York-Downtown Hotel & Residences, a new luxury property in downtown Manhattan, featuring 217 guest rooms and 222 residential units. Located at 123 Washington Street, just one block from the site of the new Freedom Tower, the W New York-Downtown Hotel & Residences will mark the W brand's arrival in New York City's recently revitalized downtown area. The newly constructed building is anticipated to open in 2008, with residential sales expected to begin in mid-2007.

The W New York-Downtown Hotel & Residences is poised to serve the growing number of visitors and residents in lower Manhattan as it continues to transform itself into a premier 21st century business district and a vibrant residential community. Lower Manhattan is now the fastest growing residential market in the city, dedicating resources to improving its waterfront spaces, parks, schools, and cultural institutions, fostering the development of a more pedestrian-friendly environment.

As the first globally branded luxury hotel and residences project of its size and scale in downtown New York, the W New York-Downtown Hotel & Residences is the first W residential development in Manhattan. Adding breadth to the W brand's New York City based portfolio, this new property joins five other W hotels in the Big Apple and further strengthens Starwood's position as the largest hotel operator in New York City with twelve renowned hotels in Manhattan.

"W is deeply connected to Manhattan and we're proud to be a part of this important project to revitalize this part of the City," said Ross Klein, President of Starwood's Luxury Brands Group. "W New York-Downtown will create a destination inside a destination, adding substance, style and luxury to Manhattan's most anticipated new development."

The 57-story building will offer all of the W signature comforts, including its Living Room experience where guests can socialize while sipping cocktails, and the Whatever/Whenever® 24-hour concierge service that can provide whatever guests want (from a bed covered in rose petals to private jet service) whenever they want it. Offering the ultimate urban lifestyle, residences will feature spectacular views of the city as well as state-of-the-art kitchen appliances and a sophisticated telecommunications infrastructure. Residents will enjoy all the services and amenities available to hotel guests, in addition to exclusive access to a residence-only lounge area, rooftop terrace with cabanas, and private spa treatment rooms. Both the hotel and residences will have dedicated full-service fitness centers.

Moinian Group, one of the nation's top real estate developers, is the owner and developer of the project and Gwathmey Siegel & Associates Architects has been named design architect for the building. SHVO Marketing is handling exclusive marketing and sales for the property and will open the W New York-Downtown Residences Welcome Center by mid-2007 at 90 West Street, directly opposite the building's construction site.

"This project will be a premier destination in downtown Manhattan because it brings both new visitors to the city and new residents to the neighborhood," said Joseph Moinian, President & CEO of Moinian Group. "The W Hotels brand, and its sophisticated, well-traveled and savvy clientele, will help shape the cultural landscape of the area, making downtown New York City an even more desirable destination."

Michael Shvo, President of SHVO Marketing, agrees. "This property offers an exceptional opportunity to live downtown," said Mr. Shvo. "Few brands can match the lifestyle appeal of W Hotels, which immediately conveys a strong contemporary style and elevated taste-level to the buyer. As big believers in downtown New York City, we're thrilled to be part of this project, and will create a dynamic, interactive sales experience for the W brand that will make buying at the W New York-Downtown Hotel & Residences a very easy decision."

About W Hotels Worldwide

Since its debut in 1998, W Hotels has been a favorite of guests and developers alike and today is a global lifestyle brand with 21 properties in the most vibrant cities around the world. Inspiring and indulging its guests with thoughtful, refreshing and stylish experiences, signature restaurants, bars and destination spas, W has become the fastest-growing luxury hotel brand in the world. Each hotel offers a unique mix of innovative design, comfort and cultural influences from fashion to music to art and everything in between. W Austin Hotel & Residences will be the Brand's second property in Texas, following the very successful W Dallas-Victory Hotel & Residences which opened earlier this year. Other recent openings include W Retreat & SpaSM - Maldives and W Seoul - Walkerhill. W has announced plans for new hotels in Philadelphia, Hollywood, South Beach, Phoenix, Scottsdale and Hoboken. Internationally, W has announced plans for hotels in Barcelona, Istanbul, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Santiago, Dubai, Doha and Koh Samui. For more information, visit www.whotels.com.

About Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc.

Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc.® is one of the leading hotel and leisure companies in the world with approximately 850 properties in more than 95 countries and 145,000 employees at its owned and managed properties. Starwood® Hotels is a fully integrated owner, operator and franchisor of hotels and resorts with the following internationally renowned brands: St. Regis®, The Luxury Collection®, Sheraton®, Westin®, Four Points® by Sheraton, W®, Le Meridien® and the recently announced AloftSM and ElementSM Hotels. Starwood Hotels also owns Starwood Vacation Ownership, Inc., one of the premier developers and operators of high quality vacation interval ownership resorts. For more information, please visit www.starwoodhotels.com.

About Moinian Group

The Moinian Group is widely regarded as one of the industry's most active development firms, boasting a portfolio totaling more than 20 million square feet of commercial, industrial, residential, retail and hotel properties throughout the U.S. and abroad. Its extensive acquisitions include trophy buildings like the Downtown Club in lower Manhattan, formerly known as the Downtown Athletic Club and home to the Heisman Trophy, the Sears Tower in Chicago and Continental Towers at 180 Maiden Lane in Downtown Manhattan. The Moinian Group aims to transform long-underutilized areas into dynamic, transit-oriented urban centers by integrating a mix of medium- and high-density residential, commercial, entertainment and cultural land uses. Striving for excellence, it sustains its leadership in the industry with a focus on creating new environments in which to grow, work and live. For more information, please visit www.moiniangroup.com.

About SHVO

SHVO, a leader in residential real estate marketing, branding and sales, brings breakthrough concepts and partnerships to the luxury condominium market. The company's recent projects in Manhattan have sent new standards for luxury residence marketing, design and living. Founded by Michael Shvo, the company's unique strategic strengths, design and technological insights, and sales expertise have resulted in an impressive roster of prestigious clients and successful projects. The SHVO signature includes innovative marketing and sales campaigns that create the right lifestyle proposition for the right buyer. In addition to marketing numerous buildings throughout New York, SHVO is actively marketing luxury properties in other major U.S. cities, Europe, Asia and Mexico. For more information, please visit www.shvo.com.

After buying four buildings on Fifth in the last two years, Joseph Moinian is buying two more for $440 million. He is in contract to buy 417 Fifth for $250 million and 245 Fifth for $190 million, two sources close to the deals said.

All of his Fifth Avenue buys have a common thread: They’re all old buildings that need a little fixing up. They’re also near Doug Durst’s budding 54-story One Bryant Park and Axel Stawski’s 27-story glass tower going up at 505 Fifth.

Mr. Moinian, no doubt, has residual foot traffic in mind.

417 Fifth Avenue is an 11-story, 392,000- square-foot building at the corner of 38th Street and across the street from the Lord & Taylor. It’s a building that was constructed in 1912, and includes Atari and Marvel Entertainment as its main tenants.

The building also has 80,000 square feet of air rights available, which was included in the deal, a source said.

One of the first things that Mr. Moinian may want to do is push up rents, since they’re far below market now. The asking rent for the only available floor is $32 per square foot, according to CoStar (whereas average rents for class-B midtown south buildings are $40 per square foot, according to Cushman & Wakefield).

The building, owned by Murray Properties and General Electric, has also been a tough sell. The building was reportedly on the block as early as January 2005, but a deal never materialized.

So the natural thing to do: Call Mr. Moinian, who has been hot for SoFi property.

Meanwhile, Mr. Moinian’s other buy is farther south at 245 Fifth, which is at the corner of 28th Street. It’s two blocks north of Madison Square Park and neighbors the Prince George Hotel and the Gershwin Hotel.

The 24-story, 287,000-square-foot Art Deco building includes the private-equity arm of BISYS and Sony BMG Publishing among its tenants. The building was constructed in 1927, and there is only one floor available for sublease.

Mr. Moinian paid $190 million for the building to KBS Realty Advisors. That’s the same KBS that is in heated negotiations to pay more than $1 billion at 60 Wall Street, according to an article in Real Estate Weekly.

For the Iranian-born Mr. Moinian, his move to the area is consistent with his trend of recent buys. Sure, he owns 10.5 million square feet of office space, much of it located downtown with buildings like 180 Maiden Lane, 95 Wall Street and the prospective 53-story W Hotel at 123 Washington Street. But he also seems to have an eye for emerging submarkets in Manhattan real estate: the Far West Side, the garment district, and now the part of Fifth Avenue that is closer to Madison Square and Bryant parks than to Central Park.

Then again, when he started buying in downtown, that was just heating up, too.

His first buy on Fifth was in 2004 for 530 Fifth Avenue, a 500,000-square-foot building that he bought for $210 million (which is where he also placed the Moinian Group headquarters). In April 2006, he bought three prewar buildings at 509, 535 and 545 Fifth Avenue, in a packaged portfolio, for $270 million.

Cushman & Wakefield’s Richard Baxter, Scott Latham, Jon Caplan and Ron Cohen advised on the 417 and 245 Fifth deals. They declined to comment.

IT'S NOT TIME TO RING THE ALARM, but what’s up with the leasing market?

As brokers return to work after the long weekend, they’re taking notice that their dependably endless stream of intel has been running dry lately.

That’s because leasing activity has scaled down in the last four months and dropped significantly since October.

A sampling of what’s happening: Leasing in November was down from October (1.9 million square feet of office space leased versus 2.1 million the month before); leasing in December was down from November (1.4 million versus 1.9 million); and leasing in January was down significantly from the average (1.5 million feet leased versus a two-million-foot average in January over the last three years), according to research provided by Cushman & Wakefield.

Now, plenty of this has to do with the fact that there is, well, not much more open space left. But it’s definitely something to note.

“I think there’s a pause in the market,” said Josh Kuriloff, an executive vice chairman at Cushman & Wakefield. “There’s been some price shock or sticker shock to pricing for the office user.”

The novice tenant, Mr. Kuriloff said, is the cause of that pause. He said tenants need a “cerebral perspective” in order to “come to grips that this is a $100 [a foot] market.” Only then will they comprehend the vagaries of Manhattan real estate.

“Let me give you a simple analogy,” he said. “If all of a sudden you wanted to enter the residential market, or you wanted to go buy a car and the prices are way up, and you’re like, ‘Damn it, maybe I’ll wait till they go down’—that’s an uneducated consumer. That’s psychology; that’s emotion.

“A car, you can produce,” Mr. Kuriloff continued. “You can’t produce new office stock overnight. So that supply isn’t coming to the market until 2010 through 2012, because you can’t get a building out of the ground.”

Panic? Might there be panic?

“There is zero panic,” he said.

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Did we miss any New York City real estate news this morning? Please send along tips and links.

The deal is in contract and is expected to close in February. A 73 percent share of the Time Warner Center hotel has been sold to Istithmar. According to the release from Mandarin Oriental International Limited, the luxury hotel is worth $340 million.

That puts the average room price at $1.37 million, which exceeds the $1.05 million per room that the W Hotel Union Square sold for in October (but less than the $1.4 million to $2 million range that was floating about last week). The Dubai-based Istithmar bought the W, too.

Mandarin Oriental will retain 25 percent of the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, down from 50 percent. And Apollo Real Estate and the Related Companies, which together once owned 50 percent as well, will now hold a (very) minority share. Mandarin will continue to manage the hotel under a long-term contract.

- John Koblin

The movie’s star, Jennifer Aniston, spent the weekend in the company of her favorite accessory, her gay hairdresser, Chris McMillan; for press interviews, she was accompanied by her co-star, Catherine Keener.

And the crowds, normally more blasé, literally chased her limousine down the street at the end of the screening.

But while the film is attracting raves and may be one of the more viable products at the festival this year, it was quite possible to believe that Ms. Aniston’s followers were chasing after the Jen of “Who Told Jen?” and “It Should Have Been My Baby!” tabloid-headline fame, not the frumpy stoner maid and man-stalker of Ms. Holofcener’s film.

Because Sundance isn’t about films.

Sure, Gwyneth Paltrow was also in Park City—for five minutes, give or take a few, to promote a short she directed. Yes, Sting stopped by a Motorola party on Saturday night with his wife, Trudie Styler, who is promoting A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints. Absolutely that was Rob Lowe—whom Hollywood is buzzing about once again for his cameo as an agent in Thank You for Smoking—at the Self magazine swag suites, scoring a new BlackBerry.

But what about the biz? “Film Fest Flurry,” cried yesterday’s Variety—but that supposed flurry only confirmed news of the second film acquisition of the festival. Not quite a blizzard.

Between the C-list Hollywooders and the outer-industry culture hoboes, the real celebrity set and the few folks actually buying films must have been a bit lonely.

All around town, you could find Lizzie Grubman with her Power Girls; Trista and Ryan from The Bachelor; Jason from Laguna Beach; James Van Der Beek, late of Dawson’s Creek and not much else; Shannon Elizabeth from American Pie; Minnie Driver, who is supposedly performing a few songs at a party; the fabulous Bai Ling, who has been out every night till at least 2 a.m.; and that woman who plays Dr. McDreamy’s wife on Grey’s Anatomy, who went straight for the Kooba bags at the Marquee Hospitality Suites. And those are just the strivers you recognize.

There were plenty of transplanted New Yorkers just hanging out, too: Dori Cooperman, a friend of Ms. Grubman’s and a New York girl about town; Mandie Erickson, the proprietor of Seventh House P.R., who’d brought her friend Simon Hammerstein, the grandson of Oscar; Dani Stahl of Nylon magazine, who was hawking her Lia Sophia collection of costume jewelry and supporting her boss, who’d made a documentary about Good Charlotte in Japan; John McDonald of Lever House; and enough fashion and lifestyle publicists to found a new, heavily publicized country.

“Hi, I’m calling to get a car for Emile Hirsch and Carmen Electra,” one publicist squealed into her cell phone on Main Street. “I need the nicest one you’ve got.”

“I’m just here pushing myself,” said linebacker Dhani Jones of the Philadelphia Eagles. No real celebrity would ever be so blunt, but in a nutshell, he described exactly what everyone was doing here: getting photos of themselves out there, getting their names in In Touch, reminding everyone that they exist. After all, wouldn’t we forget that girl from the San Francisco Real World if she didn’t show up time and again to show her face?

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?" THE D.J. SAMANTHA ROSEN ASKED an entertainment editor from Condé Nast. They were both enjoying a free lunch up at the Café Yahoo in Park City this weekend past. The entertainment editor was actually working, looking for future story ideas and cover subjects. Indeed, Ms. Ronson was working too, D.J.-ing at a party at Tao.

Everyone’s working on everything, and everyone wants you to know it. Movies, sure. But also: books, electronics, music, life-story rights and that most ephemeral product of all, lifestyle.

In other words, the tangible commodity being exchanged at Sundance is publicity. And Sundance is now just another blip on the cross-platform festival circuit, a stop on the party train, where people in the less-glamorous industries go to try to rub a little stardust on their cheeks, and hope it sticks.

Hollywood, in comparison to the other, less-hefty culture industries, clearly has the real money—no matter how loudly the trades claim it was a bad year. So publishers and agents and club promoters and musicians and restaurateurs and art dealers glom onto Sundance, hoping for some of Hollywood’s spare change. And get some they will, because every idea is fungible now in another form.

Case in point: Back in Manhattan on Monday night, up at the Guggenheim Museum, the Sundance Theatre Laboratory presented a preview of Grey Gardens, the musical by Doug Wright, Michael Korie and Scott Frankel that will open at Playwrights Horizons next month.

Sure, the authors admitted to a conceptual struggle with their adaptation of the famous 1975 documentary by the Maysles brothers. “As far as I know, a documentary has never been translated into musical theater,” said Mr. Frankel from behind the piano. “Once something is sung, it can no longer be fact,” said Mr. Korie. And the expert: “It must be historical,” the film’s (and musical’s) star, Edie Beale, who died in 2002, had written to Mr. Maysles of the forthcoming work. But come now: Fact? Fiction? In the post-Frey world, does it matter? Let’s sell an idea!

How long will it be until a movie is made of the musical of the movie? After all, didn’t we just see a film from the play from the film of The Producers? And how long until the one-woman-show version of Joan Didion’s nonfiction The Year of Magical Thinking is re-brokered by Scott Rudin and rewritten by Michael Cunningham for Christine Vachon?

Tina Brown and the Weinsteins and Talk magazine had it right about synergy and platform-agnostic and all that. They were just too early. Now anything can be anything, and anyone can be anyone. Polymorphous publicity.

AROUND 4 P.M. ON SATURDAY IN PARK CITY, AMANDA DEMME WAS RUNNING around the W Hotel Lounge at the Village at “The Lift” at the bottom of Main Street. A bi-level heated tent—the kind you find in Bryant Park during Fashion Week, where W Hotels gives out free drinks and, in the case of Utah, white golf pencils as well—the W Lounge was going to be the place to be Saturday night of the Sundance Film Festival.

Ms. Demme, the widow of the late Ted Demme, is a West Coast fixture, their Amy Sacco. With Teddy’s at the Roosevelt Hotel in Hollywood, she has made nightlife in Los Angeles hot again. Recently, she sealed a deal with W to create lounges in many of the chain’s hotels. She had flown in specifically for this event (reported cost: $700,000) tied to the Sundance Film Festival, which was being used—go figure—to publicize and market the W Hotel’s new residences in Las Vegas.

Ms. Aniston’s co-stars—Catherine Keener, Jason Isaacs, Scott Caan and the experimental-theater guru Simon McBurney—posed for photographs and chatted with journalists on the makeshift stairwell, while Ms. Demme prepared vigorously and obliviously on a couch, surrounded with various headset-clad assistants.

A small-hipped woman with wavy, dark, curly hair, she had winnowed the list down to 110, telling people there would be “absolutely no plus-ones” and that she would vet everyone at the door if necessary. (Her own publicist was apparently not even invited.) Ms. Demme had also flown in several New York party promoters: Richie Akiva, Scott Sartiano of Butter and Eugene Remm. Meanwhile, their rival, Noah Tepperberg of Marquee, had opened a version of Tao in a huge dive bar a few blocks up.

“They’re all here doing this one little party,” said Mr. Remm as he surveyed the movie publicists, photographers and hangers-on, who were equally oblivious to the preparations going on for that evening. A handsome twentysomething with a shaved head who has previously been linked to Shannen Doherty, Mr. Remm works for Level V in the meatpacking district, getting the Lindsay Lohans and Wilmer Valderramas into the club—and then, of course, into Us Weekly.

And the fact that there were probably more people planning the W Hotel event than had supposedly been invited to attend was not lost on him. Nor was the idea that he had traveled across the country to attend a film festival with no intention of even seeing a movie.

“I don’t even know where they take place,” Mr. Remm said. “I honestly wouldn’t know where to start.”

THE W LOUNGE IS ALL PART OF A LARGER COMPLEX for which celebrities and their entourages must be credentialed. There is a Yahoo diner, where the food (naturally) is free and, while the celebrities snack on mac ’n’ cheese, a publicist keeps tabs on the spellings of their names in order to feed what they ordered to the gossip columns; a Philips Electronics lounge, where select celebrities receive things like Sonicare toothbrushes and electronic razors; a Fred Segal “store” offering Le Tigre, Timberland and Rocawear products; and an Uggs “showroom.”

When an unsuspecting couple strolled up to the Uggs store on Sunday afternoon, hoping to just purchase a pair—they were perhaps the only couple in Park City for the weekend who didn’t know the meaning of schwag—a security guard laughed in their faces. “There is nothing for sale here,” he said, then turned them away.

Likewise, Americans, in general, seem nonplussed about what they’re going to buy and what they’re going to see—how else to explain the $26.8 million weekend intake of Underworld: Evolution? Despite critical acclaim, last year’s Grand Jury Prize winner at Sundance, Forty Shades of Blue starring Rip Torn, barely even received distribution. As for this year’s festival line-up, so far only Little Miss Sunshine, a comedy about a dysfunctional family at a children’s beauty pageant starring Steve Carell and Greg Kinnear, seemed poised to truly break out after it was purchased for $10.5 million by Fox Searchlight.

As crowds exited a packed screening of Wrestling with Angels—a staid, unthrilling film about Tony Kushner which emblemizes the idea that to be truly successful these days, not only must you be a widely admired playwright, write a musical and work with Steven Spielberg, but you must also be the subject of a documentary—a small gathering of people were sitting on the tented ground outside the theater, eating cold cuts out of a Ziploc bag and playing travel Scrabble. They were waiting in the cancellation line for a screening of the Shorts Program IV.

These were not your typical Sundancers. Indeed, your typical festival-goers wouldn’t know that Bobcat Goldthwait premiered a movie called Stay (about what happens after a woman performs oral sex on her dog) or, perhaps, even who Michel Gondry is (Mr. Gondry’s follow-up to Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, called The Science of Sleep and starring Gael García Bernal, has been another festival favorite).

Those festival-goers exist in the Sundance of Robert Redford myth: a place of discovery, a place where filmmakers like Steven Soderbergh could make their names.

THE NIGHT OF AMANDA DEMME'S PARTY WAS FRIGID COLD; it had snowed all day. Indeed, Ms. Aniston and her compatriot had worried they wouldn’t be able to get back to L.A. that night—remember, the real celebs don’t actually want to spend time in Sundance. But at 1:30 in the morning, Ms. Demme’s event was still hopping.

Maggie Gyllenhaal was on her way out the door, and one must give her some credit: Though she’s been popping up lately in Reebok ads, she was in Sundance in actual support of a film. In Sherrybaby, she plays a convict released from prison who wants to reconnect with her child (and, in the old Sundance tradition, she shows her breasts perhaps eight times).

Representatives for Levi’s would later boast that Ms. Gyllenhaal hadn’t taken any free clothes. As per their “gifting suite” regulations, she had given money to charity in exchange for the new slim-cut jeans. “That’s our exclusive,” the publicist said.

There were no other celebs, however, left at Ms. Demme’s party, but as D.J. AM mashed the Verve with Beyoncé, the room was full of dancing New York and Los Angeles transplants. The Bungalow-style filler was certainly not, one might think, part of Ms. Demme’s original 110 invitees, mostly because they wouldn’t exactly be recognizable to a Wireimage photographer.

But still, they filled a room, just as they’d filled the Motorola party up Main Street, and just as they’d filled Tao, which was at least five times the size of any other event space. And they’d all been there, privileged enough to go from Art Basel in December to Aspen for New Year’s and then straight to Sundance. It’s not the worst kind of life.

Indeed, Dori Cooperman—caught on her way into the Fred Segal schwag suite—might have summed it up best. “Babe,” she said, a glimmer of humor in her eyes, “would I ever miss a great party?”

The movie’s star, Jennifer Aniston, spent the weekend in the company of her favorite accessory, her gay hairdresser, Chris McMillan; for press interviews, she was accompanied by her co-star, Catherine Keener.

And the crowds, normally more blasé, literally chased her limousine down the street at the end of the screening.

But while the film is attracting raves and may be one of the more viable products at the festival this year, it was quite possible to believe that Ms. Aniston’s followers were chasing after the Jen of “Who Told Jen?” and “It Should Have Been My Baby!” tabloid-headline fame, not the frumpy stoner maid and man-stalker of Ms. Holofcener’s film.

Because Sundance isn’t about films.

Sure, Gwyneth Paltrow was also in Park City—for five minutes, give or take a few, to promote a short she directed. Yes, Sting stopped by a Motorola party on Saturday night with his wife, Trudie Styler, who is promoting A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints. Absolutely that was Rob Lowe—whom Hollywood is buzzing about once again for his cameo as an agent in Thank You for Smoking—at the Self magazine swag suites, scoring a new BlackBerry.

But what about the biz? “Film Fest Flurry,” cried yesterday’s Variety—but that supposed flurry only confirmed news of the second film acquisition of the festival. Not quite a blizzard.

Between the C-list Hollywooders and the outer-industry culture hoboes, the real celebrity set and the few folks actually buying films must have been a bit lonely.

All around town, you could find Lizzie Grubman with her Power Girls; Trista and Ryan from The Bachelor; Jason from Laguna Beach; James Van Der Beek, late of Dawson’s Creek and not much else; Shannon Elizabeth from American Pie; Minnie Driver, who is supposedly performing a few songs at a party; the fabulous Bai Ling, who has been out every night till at least 2 a.m.; and that woman who plays Dr. McDreamy’s wife on Grey’s Anatomy, who went straight for the Kooba bags at the Marquee Hospitality Suites. And those are just the strivers you recognize.

There were plenty of transplanted New Yorkers just hanging out, too: Dori Cooperman, a friend of Ms. Grubman’s and a New York girl about town; Mandie Erickson, the proprietor of Seventh House P.R., who’d brought her friend Simon Hammerstein, the grandson of Oscar; Dani Stahl of Nylon magazine, who was hawking her Lia Sophia collection of costume jewelry and supporting her boss, who’d made a documentary about Good Charlotte in Japan; John McDonald of Lever House; and enough fashion and lifestyle publicists to found a new, heavily publicized country.

“Hi, I’m calling to get a car for Emile Hirsch and Carmen Electra,” one publicist squealed into her cell phone on Main Street. “I need the nicest one you’ve got.”

“I’m just here pushing myself,” said linebacker Dhani Jones of the Philadelphia Eagles. No real celebrity would ever be so blunt, but in a nutshell, he described exactly what everyone was doing here: getting photos of themselves out there, getting their names in In Touch, reminding everyone that they exist. After all, wouldn’t we forget that girl from the San Francisco Real World if she didn’t show up time and again to show her face?

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?" THE D.J. SAMANTHA ROSEN ASKED an entertainment editor from Condé Nast. They were both enjoying a free lunch up at the Café Yahoo in Park City this weekend past. The entertainment editor was actually working, looking for future story ideas and cover subjects. Indeed, Ms. Ronson was working too, D.J.-ing at a party at Tao.

Everyone’s working on everything, and everyone wants you to know it. Movies, sure. But also: books, electronics, music, life-story rights and that most ephemeral product of all, lifestyle.

In other words, the tangible commodity being exchanged at Sundance is publicity. And Sundance is now just another blip on the cross-platform festival circuit, a stop on the party train, where people in the less-glamorous industries go to try to rub a little stardust on their cheeks, and hope it sticks.

Hollywood, in comparison to the other, less-hefty culture industries, clearly has the real money—no matter how loudly the trades claim it was a bad year. So publishers and agents and club promoters and musicians and restaurateurs and art dealers glom onto Sundance, hoping for some of Hollywood’s spare change. And get some they will, because every idea is fungible now in another form.

Case in point: Back in Manhattan on Monday night, up at the Guggenheim Museum, the Sundance Theatre Laboratory presented a preview of Grey Gardens, the musical by Doug Wright, Michael Korie and Scott Frankel that will open at Playwrights Horizons next month.

Sure, the authors admitted to a conceptual struggle with their adaptation of the famous 1975 documentary by the Maysles brothers. “As far as I know, a documentary has never been translated into musical theater,” said Mr. Frankel from behind the piano. “Once something is sung, it can no longer be fact,” said Mr. Korie. And the expert: “It must be historical,” the film’s (and musical’s) star, Edie Beale, who died in 2002, had written to Mr. Maysles of the forthcoming work. But come now: Fact? Fiction? In the post-Frey world, does it matter? Let’s sell an idea!

How long will it be until a movie is made of the musical of the movie? After all, didn’t we just see a film from the play from the film of The Producers? And how long until the one-woman-show version of Joan Didion’s nonfiction The Year of Magical Thinking is re-brokered by Scott Rudin and rewritten by Michael Cunningham for Christine Vachon?

Tina Brown and the Weinsteins and Talk magazine had it right about synergy and platform-agnostic and all that. They were just too early. Now anything can be anything, and anyone can be anyone. Polymorphous publicity.

AROUND 4 P.M. ON SATURDAY IN PARK CITY, AMANDA DEMME WAS RUNNING around the W Hotel Lounge at the Village at “The Lift” at the bottom of Main Street. A bi-level heated tent—the kind you find in Bryant Park during Fashion Week, where W Hotels gives out free drinks and, in the case of Utah, white golf pencils as well—the W Lounge was going to be the place to be Saturday night of the Sundance Film Festival.

Ms. Demme, the widow of the late Ted Demme, is a West Coast fixture, their Amy Sacco. With Teddy’s at the Roosevelt Hotel in Hollywood, she has made nightlife in Los Angeles hot again. Recently, she sealed a deal with W to create lounges in many of the chain’s hotels. She had flown in specifically for this event (reported cost: $700,000) tied to the Sundance Film Festival, which was being used—go figure—to publicize and market the W Hotel’s new residences in Las Vegas.

Ms. Aniston’s co-stars—Catherine Keener, Jason Isaacs, Scott Caan and the experimental-theater guru Simon McBurney—posed for photographs and chatted with journalists on the makeshift stairwell, while Ms. Demme prepared vigorously and obliviously on a couch, surrounded with various headset-clad assistants.

A small-hipped woman with wavy, dark, curly hair, she had winnowed the list down to 110, telling people there would be “absolutely no plus-ones” and that she would vet everyone at the door if necessary. (Her own publicist was apparently not even invited.) Ms. Demme had also flown in several New York party promoters: Richie Akiva, Scott Sartiano of Butter and Eugene Remm. Meanwhile, their rival, Noah Tepperberg of Marquee, had opened a version of Tao in a huge dive bar a few blocks up.

“They’re all here doing this one little party,” said Mr. Remm as he surveyed the movie publicists, photographers and hangers-on, who were equally oblivious to the preparations going on for that evening. A handsome twentysomething with a shaved head who has previously been linked to Shannen Doherty, Mr. Remm works for Level V in the meatpacking district, getting the Lindsay Lohans and Wilmer Valderramas into the club—and then, of course, into Us Weekly.

And the fact that there were probably more people planning the W Hotel event than had supposedly been invited to attend was not lost on him. Nor was the idea that he had traveled across the country to attend a film festival with no intention of even seeing a movie.

“I don’t even know where they take place,” Mr. Remm said. “I honestly wouldn’t know where to start.”

THE W LOUNGE IS ALL PART OF A LARGER COMPLEX for which celebrities and their entourages must be credentialed. There is a Yahoo diner, where the food (naturally) is free and, while the celebrities snack on mac ’n’ cheese, a publicist keeps tabs on the spellings of their names in order to feed what they ordered to the gossip columns; a Philips Electronics lounge, where select celebrities receive things like Sonicare toothbrushes and electronic razors; a Fred Segal “store” offering Le Tigre, Timberland and Rocawear products; and an Uggs “showroom.”

When an unsuspecting couple strolled up to the Uggs store on Sunday afternoon, hoping to just purchase a pair—they were perhaps the only couple in Park City for the weekend who didn’t know the meaning of schwag—a security guard laughed in their faces. “There is nothing for sale here,” he said, then turned them away.

Likewise, Americans, in general, seem nonplussed about what they’re going to buy and what they’re going to see—how else to explain the $26.8 million weekend intake of Underworld: Evolution? Despite critical acclaim, last year’s Grand Jury Prize winner at Sundance, Forty Shades of Blue starring Rip Torn, barely even received distribution. As for this year’s festival line-up, so far only Little Miss Sunshine, a comedy about a dysfunctional family at a children’s beauty pageant starring Steve Carell and Greg Kinnear, seemed poised to truly break out after it was purchased for $10.5 million by Fox Searchlight.

As crowds exited a packed screening of Wrestling with Angels—a staid, unthrilling film about Tony Kushner which emblemizes the idea that to be truly successful these days, not only must you be a widely admired playwright, write a musical and work with Steven Spielberg, but you must also be the subject of a documentary—a small gathering of people were sitting on the tented ground outside the theater, eating cold cuts out of a Ziploc bag and playing travel Scrabble. They were waiting in the cancellation line for a screening of the Shorts Program IV.

These were not your typical Sundancers. Indeed, your typical festival-goers wouldn’t know that Bobcat Goldthwait premiered a movie called Stay (about what happens after a woman performs oral sex on her dog) or, perhaps, even who Michel Gondry is (Mr. Gondry’s follow-up to Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, called The Science of Sleep and starring Gael García Bernal, has been another festival favorite).

Those festival-goers exist in the Sundance of Robert Redford myth: a place of discovery, a place where filmmakers like Steven Soderbergh could make their names.

THE NIGHT OF AMANDA DEMME'S PARTY WAS FRIGID COLD; it had snowed all day. Indeed, Ms. Aniston and her compatriot had worried they wouldn’t be able to get back to L.A. that night—remember, the real celebs don’t actually want to spend time in Sundance. But at 1:30 in the morning, Ms. Demme’s event was still hopping.

Maggie Gyllenhaal was on her way out the door, and one must give her some credit: Though she’s been popping up lately in Reebok ads, she was in Sundance in actual support of a film. In Sherrybaby, she plays a convict released from prison who wants to reconnect with her child (and, in the old Sundance tradition, she shows her breasts perhaps eight times).

Representatives for Levi’s would later boast that Ms. Gyllenhaal hadn’t taken any free clothes. As per their “gifting suite” regulations, she had given money to charity in exchange for the new slim-cut jeans. “That’s our exclusive,” the publicist said.

There were no other celebs, however, left at Ms. Demme’s party, but as D.J. AM mashed the Verve with Beyoncé, the room was full of dancing New York and Los Angeles transplants. The Bungalow-style filler was certainly not, one might think, part of Ms. Demme’s original 110 invitees, mostly because they wouldn’t exactly be recognizable to a Wireimage photographer.

But still, they filled a room, just as they’d filled the Motorola party up Main Street, and just as they’d filled Tao, which was at least five times the size of any other event space. And they’d all been there, privileged enough to go from Art Basel in December to Aspen for New Year’s and then straight to Sundance. It’s not the worst kind of life.

Indeed, Dori Cooperman—caught on her way into the Fred Segal schwag suite—might have summed it up best. “Babe,” she said, a glimmer of humor in her eyes, “would I ever miss a great party?”

Fortunately, there are people employed to push you onto the train and help you extricate your personal property in just such an emergency. Unfortunately, they work on the Ginza line of the Tokyo subway system, not for New York’s Metropolitan Transit Authority.

Instead, in this case, an unknown male remaining on the platform approached the subway and started to rifle through his victim’s bag. He held onto the handbag, opened it and removed her property—all while the woman was trying to pull her pocketbook to safety. Before she managed to free it, the thief absconded with a $100 Vidal Sassoon gift card, a $120 Metro-North 10-pack of tickets and her ladies’ Cole Haan wallet, in addition to her driver’s license and credit cards.

Party Monster

There are certain subjects virtually guaranteed to darken the mood at even the liveliest dinner party—for example, accusing one of your guests of stealing. That’s what happened at an East 89th Street fête on Jan. 6 after $400 belonging to the host “came up missing” shortly before midnight, according to the police.

All the guests joined in trying to help him find his cash, but without success. That’s when the host’s son, 20, entered a room where one of the guests, a 32-year-old male who lives just across the street, was searching for the dough and accused him of being the thief.

“This is what you get, bitch,” he explained, before he pummeled his parents’ visitor, causing what his victim described as serious cuts and bruises all over his body.

And while the beating victim hadn’t yet visited a hospital at the time he filed an assault complaint at the 19th Precinct, he told the cops that he’d be able to provide them with a videotape of his injuries, if not the actual incident.

The money was subsequently found.

Duh

There are certain precautions one should take before hiring a contractor. Making sure he’s insured is one of them. But perhaps equally important is removing valuables that he might take as compensation for his work if you’re not around to oversee him and he happens to discover them in your nightstand, safe or framed—as one contractor fixing a leak at a Fifth Avenue and 68th Street address did sometime between Dec. 15 and Jan. 3, when the incident was reported.

According to the apartment’s tenant, a 48-year-old woman who moved out for the duration of the repairs, she left her residence unlocked, but in the care of her super. For safekeeping, she added, she moved some artwork from her living room to her bedroom.

The good news about crooks is that they tend not to be that cultured—they’re more likely to steal your TV than your first edition of Ulysses or your Seurat study for A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte. But you’re really tempting fate, whether you move the object out of harm’s way or not, when your idea of art is framed currency, as it apparently was with this home owner.

The victim told the cops that when she returned to her apartment, she noticed that the art—described as “assorted bills” valued at $25,000—was missing. She brought the theft to the attention of her super, who found the frame—but not the money—in one of the building’s stairwells at 11:45 a.m. on Jan. 3.

The 19th Precinct detective squad and an NYPD evidence-collection team were notified. The recovered frame was valued at $10,000.

Randy Robbers

When a woman you’ve just met starts touching you all over, chances are it’s not because she finds you irresistible, as an East 64th Street resident was led to believe on Dec. 15.

He told the cops that he and some friends were having drinks at the W Hotel—he didn’t specify which location—when three women approached and suggested they join forces. There are typically only two occasions when females indulge in such unorthodox behavior: when they’re highly intoxicated or when they’ve been paid in advance. Of course, there’s a third reason someone might act in this manner: because it’s easier to pick your pocket when you’ve given them permission to put their hands down your pants.

Which seems to be the case here. The victim, 29, said that the ladies “began talking and touching” him and his friends at 10:30 p.m. The motive for their kindness only became clear when he returned to his East 64th Street residence later that evening and discovered his wallet—last seen in his pants pocket—missing. By then, the ladies had charged $600 to his credit cards at Duane Reade and ExxonMobil. They also made off with $100 in cash, a $200 Ralph Lauren money clip and his bankcard with a Buffalo Bills logo.

Anyone know who he was meeting with?