Just a Few Friends Going to the Movies

The Scene: Plenty of “Friends” and other friends were among the 700 or so people who showed up at the Directors Guild on Thursday night for the premiere of “The Pallbearer,” a dark but sugary romantic comedy starring the “Friends” TV series’ cute nice guy David Schwimmer in his first feature film lead role--where he coincidentally plays a cute nice guy who is mired in perpetual adolescence. The premiere also marked the debut of director Matt Reeves, who co-wrote the script with Jason Katims at the 1994 Sundance Filmmakers Lab. To return the favor, the event doubled as a benefit for the Sundance Institute. A reception in the DGA lobby followed the screening.

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Who Was There: Cast members Schwimmer, Michael Rapaport and Carol Kane, and director Reeves. Filling out the two screening rooms were “Friends” co-stars Matt Leblanc and Lisa Kudrow as well as Rosanna Arquette, Elizabeth Berkeley, Tea Leoni, Jonathan Silverman, Tracey Ullman, Dweezil Zappa and some 700 others. Also present was Michelle Satter, director of the Sundance Institute’s feature film program.

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Chow: The grown-up fare ranged from seared peppered ahi tuna sushi to beef tenderloin catered by Luna Park. In keeping with the movie’s not-ready-for-adulthood theme, the lobby was strewn with Monopoly money while waiters cruised through the crowd serving such kiddie treats as milk and cookies off checkerboard trays.

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What’s It All About? The movie is “about needing to get away from home and not having yet found my niche,” said Schwimmer, who was slowly losing his voice as he ran the gantlet of media and well-wishers. “It was definitely a part of my life that I remember very well, that tension of wanting to leave the family and yet being financially dependent upon the family. I was just trying to get back to an innocence and something before a sexual awareness.”

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Quoted: In a short speech before the screening, Satter said, “It’s very gratifying to me and the institute that a project can come full circle, that we can support a project as we did in the screenwriters lab in 1994 and two years later, we get to be in the Directors Guild and get you to pay some money to help us continue the program and continue the work that we’re doing.”

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Other Views: “What I did is create an excruciatingly embarrassing movie,” Reeves said. “It’s a movie about awkwardness and pain--a sad comedy in essence.” Commented Silverman, “I like it best that my best buddy is now a big movie star.”

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Money Matters: Tickets were $25 per person. Altogether $12,000 was raised for the Sundance Filmmakers Lab.