Clapping fatigue, Covid smooches and sprayed canapés: inside the Oscar nominees luncheon

I am in a hotel ballroom in Los Angeles, two floors below street level, the kind of venue I associate with family barmitzvahs and work parties. But I am talking to neither a cousin nor a colleague. Instead, I am talking to Will Smith.

So, Will, I say, just about resisting breaking into “In west Philadelphia, born and raised …” Have you been practising your Oscars speech since you were 12?

“No, not at all,” he begins, then notices me writing his God-like words in my notebook. “Wait now, this isn’t an interview! We’re just chilling, OK?”

OK, Will, I say. And so, the Fresh Prince and I chill.

Well, for five seconds anyway, until someone else comes along demanding the sunbeam of his attention. Just behind him, Javier Bardem and Penélope Cruz whisper and giggle to one another. Behind them, Benedict Cumberbatch, Andrew Garfield, Lin-Manuel Miranda and