Despite Rain, Brooks Draws ‘Good’ Crowd

The weekend storms had a few subtle effects upon Saturday’s Village Theater premiere of TriStar’s “As Good as It Gets.”

There were fewer fans, more canopies, the tape holding down the red carpet edges didn’t adhere to the wet cement and, in one fashion maven’s understated opinion, the light drizzle was “a disaster in mass proportions for hair and makeup.”

The romantic comedy had one major draw as compensation for the weather: director James Brooks. His popularity pulled in a major turnout that included Dustin Hoffman, Art Garfunkel, Courtney Love with Edward Norton, Tracey Ullman, Shirley MacLaine, Bob Daly, Mark Canton, Jeffrey Katzenberg, Barry Diller and studio brass John Calley, Chris Lee and Lucy Fisher.

While Brooks described his film as “an odd piece” (he added that “marketing people in particular wish I’d quit saying this. They keep suggesting ‘original’ ”), the audience reacted with wild applause and hoots when the credits rolled. Danny DeVito said the director’s talent was “finding out what’s inside and letting you have it with both barrels.” Garry Shandling said, “This is the kind of work people should be doing.”

After the screening, the guests willing to drive wet streets to the House of Blues arrived at a party with more social strata than King Tut’s court. Literally at the top, co-star Jack Nicholson schmoozed in the club’s upstairs Foundation Room. A floor below in the restaurant, co-stars Helen Hunt and Greg Kinnear greeted guests and ate dinner. And at the club level, Big Bad Voodoo Daddy played to the dancing proletariat.

For most of the evening, Brooks could be seen near the door talking with friends. When he spoke about his film, he said what was difficult for him “and anyone who came within a yardstick of this picture” was getting the right tone in a movie that pirouettes suddenly between moments of humor and heartache. “To do that, you need the audience to give permission,” Brooks said.

His audience, which on this night also included Tony Danza, Anthony Edwards, Nick Reed, Kerstin Meyer, Paul Reiser, Matthew Perry, Dani Janssen, David Foster, Steve Stabler and Sid Ganis, probably would have given him permission for anything.