Caviar, Lobster and Cash: A Fine Way to Mark 10th Year

Walk with me toward the Fire & Ice ball, down the narrow path of barking paparazzi, through the throngs of celebs in basic black, into the mirrored black bar and onto the dance floor under the giant glittering disco ball.

Here’s our table. It’s cozy, a supper club setting so intimate that we’ve already forgotten we’re in a cavernous ballroom at the Beverly Hilton Hotel. Try the caviar omelet. Sample the vegetable and lobster wrap. The grilled cheese and salmon sandwiches will satisfy any comfort-food craving.

We’re at the 10th anniversary of one of Hollwood’s favorite fund-raising events. With a decade behind them, the founders took time to relax a little and bask in the glow of past success. After all, Lilly Tartikoff, widow of NBC programming prodigy Brandon Tartikoff, and Ronald O. Perelman, who heads the Revlon cosmetics empire, have raised $20 million for women’s cancer research.

Take a trip down memory lane with Burt Bacharach and his orchestra. No raindrops are falling on our heads tonight.

So what if there was no glitzy fashion show, as there have been at past balls. Without Versace or Armani to lead the way, Hollywood’s famous, fabulous and fashionable were left to show off their own glad rags on Monday night.

Who were the pretty party people wearing?

“I’m not sure what brand it is,” said a tuxed-out David Arquette. Nor did he know who designed the sparkly black gown that wife Courteney Cox Arquette wore. “That’s not my job. I just have to tell her she’s beautiful.”

Arquette fidgeted like a high school senior headed to prom, while his bride worked the press line like a veteran, accompanied by fellow event hosts and dear “Friends” Lisa Kudrow and Jennifer Aniston (sans hunky hubbo Brad Pitt, who is filming in London). “I’m the date tonight,” said Arquette. “Nothing is really as high profile as this. It’s a little overwhelming.”

“Alaia,” said Renee Zellweger, turning and flipping out the tag to her clingy black gown, size small. This was no easy feat, since the back of the dress was cut down to there. She came solo (having recently split up with beau Jim Carrey). But she still seemed to need someone to fuss over. And so she smiled, sweetly rubbed straying flecks of mascara from a reporter’s face and offered up a good quote about how honored she was to be invited.

“Richard Tyler,” reported Suzanne Somers, in a strapless leather gown. It was biker black, lined with silky purple fabric, very kitten-with-a-whip. It was so tight, she joked, that Tyler had to sew her into it and might be lost somewhere under all that leather.

“Galliano,” said Ellen Barkin, whose delicate lace-and-flower confection turned heads. Barkin glowed with pride at husband Perelman’s role in what has become one of Hollywood’s most star-studded fund-raisers.

As for Tartikoff, she wore a creamy wool bare-shouldered gown with a fur-trimmed decolletage by Isaac Mizrahi, who broke his retirement to design it for her. “I feel like I dove into a pint of Haagen-Dazs vanilla bean ice cream,” she said, looking delicious while occasionally fighting the forces of gravity with little upward tugs.

Celebs Peri Gilpin, Victoria Principal, Buzz Aldrin, Jim Belushi, Dennis Franz, Sela Ward, Kristin Davis, Dennis Hopper, Antonio Banderas and Melanie Griffith turned out by the limo-load for an event they favor because the money raised goes directly to the Revlon/UCLA Women’s Cancer Research Program. The program is headed by Dr. Dennis J. Slamon, chief of oncology at the UCLA School of Medicine. He also heads a team of researchers and physicians at UCLA’s Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center. Slamon also treated Brandon Tartikoff, who was 48 when he died three years ago after a long battle with cancer.

There was good news to toast as Lilly Tartikoff urged about 875 guests to raise their glasses. For starters, she said, they are seeing direct results from their decade of fund-raising. A new, nontoxic cancer drug called herceptin is now in clinical trials.

Courteney Cox Arquette said the research has touched her personally because her friend and publicist, Nancy Ryder, is undergoing treatment with herceptin.

And there were plenty of tributes to the determined Tartikoff. “This has all happened because Lilly had a dream,” Kudrow said. “She also had lots of chutzpah and Brandon’s Rolodex.”

The event, named after Revlon’s classic Fire & Ice red lipstick shade, was an instant Hollywood hit, drawing such first-name-only supernovas as Cher, Clint, Warren and Annette, and Arnold and Maria.

Reminiscing, Tartikoff referred to her past fund-raisers as the “Isaac Ball,” the “Armani Ball,” and the “Versace Ball,” after the featured designers. The celebrity guests reflected the designers, Tartikoff said. “Each year was a surprise. The Versace year, it was a certain list. The Armani year, another list.”

Choking back her emotions Monday night, Tartikoff basked in the love-fest and offered her own tribute:

“Here’s to you, Brandon Tartikoff, wherever you may be.”