Wednesday 19 May 2010

My own personal emotional rollercoaster...

Dear lord what a day I’ve had! The highs! The lows! The middle bits!! Seriously, I’ve had such a crazy spectrum of emotions today - I’m exhausted! I woke this morning to the sounds of Jo getting up to see Mike Leigh speak at the British Pavilion - I think she took one look at me and wrote me off completely - I wasn’t human this morning. Messy doesn’t even cover it. Unfortunately, it was at this time that disaster struck. Our hotel room needs the key to close the door properly (I know, weird huh? Europeans.) so Jo chirpily said ‘Don’t forget to lock the door behind me as I leave’ before prancing disgustingly cheerfully out the door. I, of course, mumbled something, snorted and turned over.


AND LEFT THE DOOR UNLOCKED!! NOT JUST UNLOCKED - OPEN!! WIDE OPEN!!! FOR 2 HOURS!!

I’m lucky I wasn’t killed in my sleep! To be honest, the way I felt when I woke up made me wish that I had been (wine + champagne x 20 over 8 hours = uuuuurrrrrrggggg……)

But the worst part is that it appears that while I was blissfully snoozing away, someone CAME INTO OUR APARTMENT AND STOLE MY IPHONE!!!! And the charger - these thieves are no fools!

I’M PHONELESS!!! IN CANNES!!! WHY DIDN’T THEY JUST CUT OFF MY OXYGEN SUPPLY?!?! TAKE MY LIVER!! TAKE MY KIDNEYS!! JUST GIVE ME BACK MY PHONE!!!! IT HAS MY LIFE ON IT!!!!

So many contacts. Phone numbers. Emails. Gone.

I could cry. I really could.

So now I’m incontactable. In Cannes.

This. Is. A. Disaster.

I managed to scrap myself together in order to go to my lunch meeting with a friend from PR agency DDA at Long Beach Restaurant and then on to the British Pavilion to see our BFI contact as I knew he would have been trying to get in touch with me. He’s so lovely. Turns out I had even more reason to love him - he’d managed to score me a ticket to one of the hottest premieres of the festival!! The much coveted, much feted Stephen Frears production of Tamara Drewe, starring the actress of 2010 Gemma Arterton!! It was like a drug deal. He palmed me something and told me slyly to slip it into my bag. Then I ruined the coolness of the moment by hugging him (he's 6 foot 7 - I'm 5 foot 4. It was an awkward moment).

Then, I panicked. It started in an hour and a half and I wasn’t dressed for a premiere!!! I only had the vintage dress we’d bought in our ‘perfect Cannes outfit for under £50’!! I said a breathless goodbye (and thank you - my mamma raised me polite) to Nick and rushed off into the setting sun, hustling down La Croisette desperate to find a cab, get back to the apartment and jzoosh myself appropriately for my red carpet appearance and be back, striding down that red carpet, all withing an hour!

Yeah, that didn’t really work.

Picture me running (ok, it was more of a totter - I was in my Kurt Geiger heels!) down the main stretch of Cannes, madly waving at every moving vehicle and swearing violently under my breath at each one that didn’t stop. For 35 minutes. I finally had to admit defeat. I wasn’t going to be able to get home, wasn’t going to be able to change, wasn't going to be  able to glam myself appropriately. And I was, in fact, sweatier and less attractive than I was when I set out from the British Pavilion over 40 minutes ago. Bloody marvellous.

I took stock. I had my £12 light blue silk vintage dress and a pencil of black eyeliner. I inhaled a deep breath and strode off in search of a bathroom.

I battled, I cursed, I sprayed water in my hair and let it dry upside down. I stroked, and smudged, and smeared.

I looked like a mad woman. A woman possessed. Other women coming and going in the bathroom looked on with equal measures of amusement and distaste. I was the woman I never wanted to be. The bathroom jzoosher.

But a fearful 15 minutes later I strode out, transformed (relatively speaking). I was ready.

And guess what?? I actually got papped by more cameras than when I was in my full evening gown two nights ago! I got asked where my dress was from (I lied through my teeth of course - ‘oh, this old thing? Hmmm….I think I got this positively years ago at Dior…or was it Givenchy? I can’t possibly remember my dears!’)

…..course, they might just have papped me for the ‘Worst Dressed’ photo montage in OK Magazine…..

Regardless, I was there. I strode down the red carpet fearlessly, head held high with an smile plastered on my face that hinted toward lunacy (I hope I pulled off eccentricity instead - much more glam).

Keep tuned to You Tube (yes we will get something new posted on there! I’m on a mission today) for my review of T.D. as well as a few other amusing bits and bobs we’ve managed to film over out crazy, mad week here in Cannes!

I can’t believe we’re going home tomorrow. I might cry.

Lots of love, panicked bathroom moments, red carpet victories and flashes of paparazzi photographers,

Zxxx