New York, January 15, 2008 – One more non-televised awards gala went unscathed by the WGA strike on Tuesday when Hollywood A-listers walked the red carpet at the 2007 National Board of Review Awards gala.  NBR president Annie Schulhof didn’t think that Tuesday’s capacity crowd was due to Globes-induced awards-starvation. “People want to come.  We throw a great party.”  Best Actor honoree George Clooney agreed, saying it’s “really fun” to celebrate with his fellow actors.  “I’m going to get them all drunk here in a minute”, Clooney quipped on his way into the gala.  Clooney is not optimistic about his Oscar chances: “There’s this Daniel Day-Lewis cat out there that just keep stepping on everybody.”

“It’s an honor, and I guess I should say it’s a shock”, Ben Affleck said of his directorial debut honors for Gone Baby Gone.  “I could easily imagine the situation where my first movie ended with me in hock to the studio and having to sell off everything I own to pay back my debts”, he added.  Brother Casey Affleck seemed a bit shell-shocked amidst all the hooplah – he’d become a father for the second time only a couple of days before. 

Another new father, Tim Burton, said of his Sweeney Todd star Johnny Depp, “He’s always trying something new, and you know, he’s never sang before”.   “He may never sing again”, Burton added.

Writer Diablo Cody called it a weird coincidence that 16-year-old Jamie Lynn Spears announced her pregnancy just as her teen pregnancy film Juno came out.  “I hope that people don’t think we were part of some vast conspiracy.  But that was pretty weird.”