You Think You Know... But You Have No Idea

Senior Editor Faran Krentcil spent last weekend hobnobbing with the stars at the prestigious Hamptons Film Festival. Not there merely to look good, she played a leading role in Alma Mater, one of the festival's featured films. Here's a day-by-day journal of her experiences:

October 17: I'm curled in the back of the family Audi, watching the ocean whoosh past. In the BMW next to us, a woman is buried in Burberry. She takes off her big Gucci sunglasses, turns to face our car and I realize I was wrongâ??the Burberry bitch can't be more than 13. Oh God, I think, I am so not cool enough for this weekend.

October 18: While checking into the festival, I'm given the following things: nine movie passes, four Godiva chocolates, two Gotham magazines and one HBO flashlight. "Oh wait," says the woman with a nametag on her Hermes scarf. "Take these."

She reaches into a VIP box and whips out Barney's body lotion and a Tahari shirt. I smile, thinking she's seen my movie. "I'm VIP?" The woman squints her eyes and says, "Wait. Aren't you Julia Stiles?"

October 19: We didn't win the Audience Favorite award for nothing. Sitting in the back of a packed cinema, I watch the crowd watch my face onscreen. Alma Mater, deals with six characters at 1963 Harvard University. Since they're not as smart as the Duke kids, the characters mess up and make up through the whole movie. The audience laughs a lot. The audience cries a lot. The audience coughs at the appropriate, uncomfortable time. Then they clap. Oscars for everyone!

October 20: A casting director stops me after the film. He is wearing cashmere but smells like leather. "You were fabulous in that movie," he says. "You should come to New York. We'll make you a great little movie star." I look at him and wonder when he took his LSD.

"Are you serious?" I ask.

"Yes," he says. "But you'll never be Julia Stiles."