New York, May 27, 2009 – Ladies really shined at this year’s FiFi Awards, the Fragrance Foundation’s annual honors.  We were relieved to learn that Ernest Borgnine does not have a fragrance on the market, but his lovely wife, Tova, does, and was nominated for a FiFi.  “This is not my night.  This is her night,” Mr. Borgnine happily informed us, although he couldn’t help taking just a little credit.  “Well, I helped her pick out the first perfume that got her started, and so I feel like a part of it,” he said, beaming. 

Ditto for Dustin Hoffman, who noted that for once it was he who was accompanying his wife to an award ceremony.  Lisa Hoffman has a growing fragrance business  “Being here is just beyond anything I’ve ever imagined,” she said.  She says Dustin doesn’t really wear scents.  “But he loves to smell it on me.”

And Paris Hilton was honored at the FiFi’s for her commercially successful fragrances.  “Fragrance is really a passion of mine.  It’s very exciting; every year it does so well,” she told us backstage, and added that it felt nice to receive the award. 

Presenters at the awards included Kate Walsh, Queen Latifah and Mary J. Blige.  But men weren’t totally ignored: Marc Jacobs received a lifetime achievement award, and Sean “Diddy” Combs’s Sean John fragrance I Am King took top honors in the men’s luxe category.