Las Vegas Weekly

March 16, 2010 · 11:10 AM

Sex and the City stars lead award-winner arrivals for ShoWest

By Robin Leach

Sex and the City.

Photo: Courtesy

Today is opening day of this year’s ShoWest movie convention at Paris and Bally’s, and Hollywood stars join with studio moguls and theater owners worldwide for the meetings and exhibits. ShoWest covers everything from new movies, projectors and digital technology delivery of films to even the newest popcorn machines. The new “movie ticket to your cell phone” technology will be unveiled this year.

Among the stars jetting in will be the four Sex and the City beauties: Sarah Jessica Parker, Kim Cattrall, Kristin Davis and Cynthia Nixon. They lead the celebrity invasion for Thursday night’s closing awards banquet. Each gets an award as the Best Ensemble Cast of the Year.

Other winners attending this week are Katherine Heigl, Female Star of the Tear; Sam Worthington, Male Star of the Year; Vanessa Hudgens, Female Star of Tomorrow; Alex Pettyfer, Male Star of Tomorrow; and Amanda Seyfried, Breakthrough Performer of the Tear. Mega producer Jerry Bruckheimer will be presented with the Lifetime Achievement Award.

It’s a reunion for The Hangover’s Zach Galifianakis and director Todd Philips, who wins the Director of the Year Award. Zach, who wowed audiences in the movie, will win an award as Comedy Star of the Year. The Hangover, filmed here in Las Vegas with many location scenes at Caesars Palace, was the ninth-largest-grossing movie last year with a worldwide box office of $467,322,503. It has since topped the $300 million mark in the U.S. alone and is the highest-grossing R-rated comedy of all time.

Here’s a YouTube trailer of The Hangover.

Todd told Vegas DeLuxe when the DVD was launched with a party at Caesars Palace that a sequel was being written with South Beach as the proposed location. I’ll chat with him Thursday for the latest updates.

The final winner headed here was announced yesterday: Young Jaden Smith was named as the Breakthrough Male Star of the Year, and his new Karate Kid movie with Jackie Chan will be screened for the first time tomorrow to ShoWest delegates. It will be a summer release starting June 11. Jaden is the son of Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith, and at least one of them will be on hand here for the awards ceremony. Jaden made his film debut co-starring with his dad in The Pursuit of Happyness and already has won several awards, including an MTV Movie Award for Breakthrough Performance and a Saturn Award for Best Performance by a Younger Actor.

The first screening of Disney Pixar’s Toy Story 3 is today. Vegas DeLuxe will have the daily rundown of the anticipated big summer hits. One of the most eagerly awaited is Disney’s Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time from Jerry and starring Jake Gyllenhaal that will be screened for the first time Thursday. Both films are unfinished, so reviews are forbidden, and security will be doubled to prevent anybody from recording the films.

ShoWest is the largest annual international convention for motion picture industry professionals and is expected to draw more than 5,000 delegates from 50 countries.

Robin Leach has been a journalist for more than 50 years and has spent the past decade giving readers the inside scoop on Las Vegas, the world’s premier platinum playground.

Follow Robin Leach on Twitter at Twitter.com/Robin_Leach.

Follow Vegas DeLuxe on Twitter at Twitter.com/vegasdeluxe.

Follow VDLX Editor Don Chareunsy on Twitter at Twitter.com/VDLXEditorDon.

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