Stargazing

Today sex comes to this city. Sarah Jessica Parker, recently crowned Woman of the Year by the Hasty Pudding Theatricals (HPT), will strut down Mass. Ave. flanked by men whose sense of style rivals Carrie Bradshaw’s. The celebrated actress hits Cambridge courtesy of HPT’s annual celebrity roasts. In a week, Man of the Year Bruce Willis will get his roast as well. According to HPT staff, it is usually not tough to convince megawatt stars to accept the nationally recognized Man and Woman of the Year awards. It is more difficult, however, to pick exactly which stars get to take home a pudding pot.

“We choose our winners because they have made a lasting and significant contribution to the field of entertainment,” says HPT press manager Joanna S. B. O’Leary ’03,who is apparently already comfortable with hokey-sounding PR platitudes. The HPT executive board meets over the summer to consider which stars to honor. O’Leary, who is not directly involved in the selection process, does not detail the selection timeline but emphasizes that the executive board knows who is booked for Man and Woman of the Year well before the information is publicly released. HPT fiercely protects news of its selection in order “to build anticipation and allow for better containment of the media frenzy over the celebrations,” according to O’Leary. Once the honorees are chosen, the business manager of the Man and Woman of the Year events contacts publicists and orchestrates the logistics of bringing Hollywood to Harvard.

The Theatricals isn’t the only student group to bring prominent entertainers to Harvard. Each year the Harvard Lampoon, a semi-secret Sorrento Square organization that used to occasionally publish a so-called humor magazine, also gives out a limited number of unique awards and honorary memberships to celebrities. According to Lampoon editor Dennis J. Mak ’03, celebrities often contact the Lampoon through Lampoon graduates working in Hollywood to express their interest in coming to campus. “They often are interested in coming based on other celebrities’ positive experiences here,” Mak says. But not everyone comes knocking on the castle door. The Lampoon also extends invitations to celebrities based on the popularity and relevance of their recent work. The group’s most recent guest, actor Elijah Wood, was honored in January as the “Best Actor of All Time.” According to Mak, Wood “was thrilled by our honor and immediately accepted our invitation.”

The Lampoon’s success in bringing stars to campus actually extends to the Man and Woman of the Year festivities, according to a Lampoon editor who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Although the event is HPT-sponsored and the final decision of whom to honor rests with HPT’s executive board only, “the Pudding often uses the Lampoon’s connections to the entertainment and media industries to secure celebrities for Man and Woman of the Year,” he claims.

According to this source, the relationship between HPT and the Lampoon began in 1989, as the Pudding looked to line up Crispin Glover, up-and-coming co-star of Back to the Future Part II (he played George McFly). Unfortunately, Glover had already committed to shooting the film Where the Heart Is and cancelled his appearance at Harvard only two days in advance. “Pudding members pleaded for help from the Lampoon, and staffer Glenn McDonald ’89 immediately went to work,” the Lampy editor writes in an e-mail. “Just 24 hours later, he lined up former Lampoon guest Robin Williams.” Since then, he explains, the Lampoon has done much of the significant guest-relations work for Man and Woman of the Year. Last year, he says, Drew Barrymore’s selection was finalized when a Lampoon member called a Lampoon graduate, who sealed the deal with Drew’s agent and publicist. The Lampoon staffer speculates that “the Pudding is so secretive about the selection for Man and Woman of the Year for good reason. The Lampoon has played a significant and uncredited role in their work and still does.” Pudding members refused to confirm or deny whether there has been any collaboration between the two celebrity ass-kissing organizations.

The ’Poonster also claims that when Lampoon members discovered earlier this year that HPT was planning on honoring Jessica Simpson this February (an allegation Pudding members unequivocally deny), they urged HPT to look for a person more appropriate and deserving of the award. Whether it was at the Lampoon’s recommendation that HPT secured Sarah Jessica Parker for today’s parade is unclear, but regardless of who swayed the votes, parade viewers can savor the celebrated actress and style maven instead of America’s third- or fourth-favorite pop princess, who is actually more resistible than she thinks.