The crux of luxe

On the day before the Oscars, the most important person in Los Angeles is not the president of the academy or Harry Winston or even the guys from PricewaterhouseCoopers with their safe full of tantalizing envelopes. On the day before the Oscars, the most important person in Los Angeles is Grant Ponder, the director of pool services at the Four Seasons Hotel.

Young, dark and handsome, Ponder is the dreamy template of a pool manager, the man in charge of making sure that the nominees and assorted stars soaking up the sun get something special -- cool towels, frozen fruit, jet-lag-fighting smoothies -- every 20 minutes. He’s the final line of defense against wily paparazzi. And, perhaps most important, he’s the final arbiter of lounge chair assignment. The hotel has a no-save policy, he explains, which means an untenanted chair is cleared of paperbacks or towels or sandals after an hour. “But,” he adds, with a smile full of wide-eyed charm, “it is up to my discretion.”

The smile is pure Four Seasons, radiating the hotel’s dictum of “friendly but not familiar” and the premium it puts on self-confidence and exquisite dental health. It also explains, in a moment, how this young man, in his casual sweater and shorts, can negotiate a high-density area with limited resources and still keep even the divas happy.

From January to the ides of March, every big, swank hotel in Los Angeles has a little extra star-studding in its decor. The Peninsula, the Bel-Air, the Chateau Marmont are all just a little more luminous during awards season.

But nothing like the Four Seasons.

On a slow day in January, you might see Robert Duvall, Spike Lee, Liam Neeson and Natasha Richardson, or Denzel Washington saunter through the lobby, settle in for brunch. But during Oscar week, the hotel is wall-to-wall nominees, presenters, studio executives and just plain old movie stars.

During Oscar week, the Four Seasons becomes not so much a hotel as a vigilantly maintained biosphere, an alternate universe in which no need goes unmet, no awkward moments need occur, no situation arises that cannot be dealt with quickly and in measured, friendly tones. The diamonds are delivered, the lost tickets found, the last-minute selection of handbags wrangled and the forgotten tuxedo is conjured as if from thin air.

Watching the staff of the Four Seasons prepare for Oscar week is like watching the introductory scenes of a Robert Altman movie -- everyone is perfectly cast, their movements and attire impeccably suited to the role they play. Here is the guest relations manager with her speech-stopping smile; here is the doorman ready for a bit of friendly banter; the concierge and his how-can-I-help-you mien; the chef, a European sophisticate in his dazzling whites.

The 600 members of the staff move along the marble floors, through the inevitable vaguely European elegance that marks a fine hotel -- the accent bowls of fruit, the oversized flower displays, the period-echo furnishings with their reliance on velvet and scrolled woodwork. They carry clipboards and BlackBerries, push luggage trolleys and move quickly to hold open a door or pick up a dropped scarf. None ever appears incredulous at a request or irritated by a peevish attitude and every last one of them is operating on DefCon Five.

Because when you aspire to be the hotel of the entertainment industry, it all pretty much leads up to one afternoon and one goal: to keep this year’s A-list guests happy and relaxed, of course. But also to get them pedicured, bow-tied, zipped up, taped down and into the limos on time.

Making the list

It is impossible to get a reservation at the Four Seasons for Oscar weekend before the nominations are announced. Many people are waitlisted, but no actual reservations are made until after the 5:30 a.m. reading of the nominees.

Carol Watkins, head of entertainment sales, is up at 4 with the television on. The moment the announcement is made, she gets out the waitlist and gets on the phone. Nominees, of course, are first priority, and not just the E-ticket categories. “We want the nominees,” Watkins says. “All of them.”

The hotel’s rack rates begin at $375 a night and move toward $1,000 for a luxury suite, but within four days of there being no one, technically, staying at the Four Seasons for Oscar weekend, the 285 rooms in the hotel are full. With talent, studio executives, top designers and high-end jewelers, movie investors and big television advertisers.

Watkins is a woman with the ability to answer e-mails while talking on the phone without the person she’s talking to knowing it and a soft spot for working mothers -- she throws an annual Halloween party for the children of local publicists.

She has been with the hotel since its 1987 opening, so she knows a lot of publicists. In 1989, she began hosting a few press junkets, but the big push started in the early ‘90s, when other events were declining. And junkets are good business; relationships bloom, corporate rates are negotiated, and when it’s time for the Oscars, publicists go where the talent feels comfortable.

Nowadays, so many stars use the garden and meeting spaces for photo shoots that the hotel has to change its banquet chairs every year to keep the look from becoming cliched.

After guests are confirmed, the rooms must be assigned, a process that requires the delicate negotiation skills of a wartime ambassador.

“During this time,” says General Manager Mehdi Eftekari, “I have more best friends than anyone in the world.”

Although his rule is “first come, first served,” he does not deny that he gives preferential treatment to longtime customers. “Most Oscar guests have stayed with us many times before,” says Joseph Jester, director of rooms division. “So we know who likes what suite, who needs the balcony, who likes what layout, whatever. Still, it can get a little ...,” he pauses a discrete half-beat, “tense, figuring out who goes where.”

Jester cuts a dapper figure in his various dark suits; he has worked at the hotel for 15 years and has the dry delivery of a Wodehouse character. He is the one who tells the story of the guests who called from the limo to say they had left their Oscar tickets in a hotel safe deposit box, could someone get them and send them right over.

“They hadn’t forgotten the key, of course,” Jester says deadpan. “They had that with them. Which meant we had to find a safecracker and drill the things out. In a half an hour.”

Indeed, you will never hear a staff member say “No” or “We can’t.” That is not part of the Four Seasons vocabulary, says Eftekari, even when dealing with celebrity guests -- many of whom have, he says diplomatically, “special needs.”

Like security and privacy issues, all of which are taken into consideration when assigning rooms, along with the political -- who trumps who at which studio -- and the personal -- who dumped who and for whom? “It takes a while,” Jester says. “But in the end, we give everyone exactly what they need.”

This is, of course, the mantra of every good hotel. But at the Four Seasons, the “everyone” is a bit more broadly defined to include not only guests but, at least at this time of year, their friends, their adoring public and the media.

The line walked in creating an atmosphere with industry heat that also promises privacy is thin and perilous. One false move and you’re a hotel has-been, grateful to get some of the brattier Grammy nominees. During the weeks preceding the Oscars, Sarah Cairns, director of public relations, is shoring up that line, spending more hours in the hotel than out of it.

Tall, blond, and Scottish, though with a British finishing-school accent, Cairns signs off on any photo shoot or filming in the hotel -- if a staff member sees anyone with a camera with more than one lens, he or she will approach with a polite: “Have you spoken with Sarah yet?”

Cairns also helps arrange television and print interviews, which during the last week in February are occurring virtually every moment in every public room, and keeps an eye on ambient media activity, offering coffee and juice and making sure that everything is comfortable -- but also, make no mistake, under control.

“We need our guests to feel safe and at home,” she says. “But we also want them to feel like they are in the heart of it all. I love it,” she adds, striding through the hotel, her heels clattering on the marble. “The energy, the buzz. It’s addictive.”

There are other times when the hotel is filled with the rich and powerful and their pillow preferences. But from the doorman to the general manager, everyone talks about the Oscar buzz. It is the nervous euphoria that fuels football teams and chorus lines -- the high-profile team effort. In Los Angeles, where almost all the waiters are wannabe actors and sales managers are working on their screenplays, it is rather remarkable to see so many people who seem to enjoy what they are actually doing.

Awards for all seasons

During January and February, the Four Seasons is a microcosm of Hollywood: Golden Globes give way to the AFI luncheon gives way to the SAG and DGA awards give way to the Grammys.

“It gives us a chance to practice,” says Randy Burton. “Like for the SAG awards, we had 40 limos here, as opposed to the 140 we have for the Oscars.”

Beneath his cap -- tan for mornings and afternoons, black for evening -- Burton has the round, open face of a Midwestern shortstop. When he joined the staff 18 years ago, he chose doorman; he likes being outside and seeing pretty much everyone who comes into the hotel.

By the middle of February, everything that can be done in preparation for the Oscar onslaught has been done. The champagne has been delivered -- the lounge and room service will go through 150 bottles in two days. Executive Chef Conny Andersson has tweaked the menu and Executive Pastry Chef Donald Wressell has assembled his annual 5-foot-high sugar sculpture depicting the year’s best picture nominees. Signs in staff-only areas warn about the impossibility of taking vacations before March 2. The heavy lifting begins this Thursday, when people start checking in. Guest Relations Manager Lena Elfmont, who recently joined the staff after the St. Regis in Century City closed, greets each VIP client personally. Elfmont is young and model-pretty with a wardrobe tending toward subdued colors; she embodies the self-confident solicitude the hotel has cultivated.

“Some you do get close to,” she says. “They want to talk, want you to ask them about their day or what they’re working on. Others are polite but want more privacy. You learn to read people pretty quickly.”

This is the skill Eftekari, the general manager, says he prizes most -- one can be taught to carry a tray properly or use the computer more efficiently, but the ability to be friendly but not familiar is an art form. Overwhelm the guest with attention or appear uninterested, and you become a former Four Seasons employee.

Elfmont takes high-profile guests to their room herself and if they don’t like something, she’s the one who hears about it. Not that there should be any surprises -- the hotel keeps a profile on each of their guests, and for VIPs those profiles are as detailed as every staff member, down to the busboys and room attendants, can make it. If a guest sleeps exclusively on the left side of the bed, that will be the side turned down.

Still, human nature is fickle, and there are inevitably issues that must be addressed. Last-minute room changes, especially high up the food chain, can throw whole floors into disarray. Martina Flores, head of housekeeping, brings on extra staff for Oscar weekend, so if an adjustment is needed, she’s ready. “I can turn a room in 15 minutes,” she says.

“Thursday is crazy, Friday is crazier,” says concierge Charles Hawkins. “We have check-ins and then wardrobe arriving and flowers and gift baskets. We have Oscar tickets being dropped off and party tickets, and those are like dynamite. We put them into the safe and count them every night to make sure none are missing.”

The concierge desk is where most guests take their questions and problems. In his vested suit with tails and the official Les Clefs d’Or in his lapels, Hawkins has the collegiate good looks often associated with firefighters, paramedics and other men in uniform. (In fact, it would not be surprising to learn that a very tasteful Men and Women of the Four Seasons calendar was in the works.)

Hawkins, who has been through 11 Oscars here, still finds a thrill in the bustle as it crescendos toward Sunday -- the gorgeous rattle of the dress racks laden with gowns, the stylists and groomers who all know the staff and each other chatting as they head up to their client’s rooms, the hothouse scent of an endless parade of flowers.

“Although,” he says with a quick grin, “every once in a while you’ll see a gift basket that is just pretty sad. And it’s hard. You want to keep it back or fix it or something.”

So many floral arrangements and goodie bags come through on Friday and Saturday that Chef Concierge Marta Krejci reserves a banquet room to keep them safe and sends the bellmen out on delivery runs three times a day. And she often joins them, loading up a luggage trolley or just grabbing an armful of gift bags. “I start at the 16th floor and work my way down,” she says. “If I don’t have a trolley, I take the stairs. It’s good exercise.”

Krejci covers so much ground during these four days that she has special Oscar shoes. “They are like slippers. Very comfortable and flexible. Not so pretty, but I figure if I keep moving, no one will notice.”

‘Does not like apples’

On the walls of the room-service prep area, two grease boards list guests and their various allergies and food preferences, and Post-its with newly gleaned information -- “does not like apples,” “can call by first name” “prefers Evian” -- feather the cupboards, the refrigerator, the coffee station, the windows of staff offices. Around the corner is the “Show Them You Know Them” wall on which Xeroxed photos and mini-profiles of VIP guests are taped so the staff can greet them by name and, perhaps, industry. On a regular day, there might be 20 on the wall; on Oscar weekend, overlapping pages go from floor to ceiling.

Although some of the Oscar guests go out on the town, most like to just hole up in the hotel, and nowhere in the hotel is busier than the kitchen. Orders for room service simply never stop, and Chef Andersson, tall and Nordic in his white coat and toque, is prepared to whip together an ensuite dinner for dozens with a half-hour’s warning.

“We don’t do Oscar parties after [the show], but often people will want to meet with their friends in their room or the restaurant,” he says. “And we are prepared.”

The strangest menu request? Pastry Chef Wressell answers that one. “Someone once phoned down and wanted, like, a gallon of whipped cream,” he says with a polite laugh. “I believe strawberries were also involved.”

At breakfast on Saturday and Sunday, as many as 140 rooms, as opposed to the average 100, will order breakfast in bed. In the small preparation space, a dozen staff perform a complicated waltz of cutlery and omelets with carts spilling out into the corridor and kitchen.

“It gets pretty loud,” says Enrique Martinez, assistant manager of room service. “And it never stops. Usually there’s a pause between breakfast and lunch, but that weekend, no pause.”

Three floors up, the spa has been booked longer than the hotel has, with studios and advertisers claiming huge blocks of time that they then give to the talent or other industry folks. “But I keep time aside for registered guests,” says Liz Ratcliff, spa director. In the past she has brought in extra people, but she would rather work with her own staff, so this year, she has extended the spa’s hours, but out-of-town guests vie for the daylight hours.

“They all want their massages by the pool, their pedicures by the pool,” says Ratcliff. “My technicians are shivering because, for Angelenos, it’s cold in February.”

On Friday and Saturday night, the crowd moves from the pool to the popular Windows Lounge. Even on a normal weekend, the bar is so crowded Philip Spee must often restrict it to hotel guests, which leads to some creative attempts at entry. “People have tried to sneak in from the patio, from the kitchen,” he says. “Or they say, ‘I’m bringing in some big star and I have to check out the room.’ Like I don’t know that when someone big comes, their people always call ahead.”

Sunday crunch

If you ask a group of Four Seasons managers to name their favorite Oscar story, the incident of the crystal dress will inevitably come up. A few years ago, one guest had a dress encrusted with African crystals, some of which, she discovered as she put it on, had been crushed in transit. So out went a staff member to find the replacement crystals. African crystals. On Sunday.

“We will do anything for the talent,” says Watkins simply.

So if Saturday is festive, Sunday is usually quiet, but in a very intense sort of way. The nine phone lines at the concierge get busy, and stay busy, from about 7 a.m. on with requests for handbags, shawls, shoe repair, make-up brushes, and ties. “You would be amazed what people forget,” says Hawkins. “Especially first-timers -- shoes, pantyhose, tuxedos. Sometimes they forget to order limos and try to call that day.”

And while a big star will have an entourage of stylists, nominees in the less celebrated categories and studio executives and their spouses rely more on the hotel staff to help out.

Some requests have become so standard that the staff can fill them immediately -- many of the male staff, who have created a tuxedo repair kit, bring in their own cufflink collections and spend the early afternoon going room to room tying bowties. Krejci and other women on staff drag in shawls, handbags, fresh combs and brushes.

A year or so ago, and hours before show time, Jester had to find double-sided fabric tape for a guest who was having a wardrobe malfunction. “Now,” he says, “we have it at the desk.”

Around noon, the lobby is wall-to-wall stylists on their way to the big suites and the hotel has two seamstresses who are hemming and tucking from Friday to minutes before pickup. “I have two people just sitting in their cars behind the hotel on call,” says Krejci. And if they are already on an errand, any staff member who is free will go.

Hawkins remembers being asked for a Russian/English dictionary, a request he found a little strange. Until he watched one of his guests win the Oscar for best foreign language film and pull the dictionary out of his pocket to make his acceptance speech.

As the guests begin actually getting ready, job descriptions among the staff go out the window. Last year was Flores’ first year as head of housekeeping, and she spent three hours with another staff member ironing hundreds of creases into a dress because a guest at the last minute didn’t think they were sharp enough. As the hours tick down, staff literally run from room to room with shoes and handbags and needle and thread like so many parents the day of senior prom. “I have sewn women into their dresses and been waiting with a seam ripper when they got back,” says Krejci.

Outside the hotel, it’s even more electric. There is a red carpet leading to the curb and 140 limousines wrap the hotel like an evening cloak. Steve Berardi and Ron Murphy, director of security and security manager, are at either side of the entrance facing the lobby while other security is posted at the various entrances. Paparazzi and fans line the sidewalks across the street.

“We keep the lobby open to registered guests only,” says Murphy. “People are allowed to be in the lounge, but there are no cameras allowed, and as of this year, no camera cellphones. And if they bother one of the guests, we will intervene.”

Meanwhile, an officer is guiding traffic in an attempt to avoid complete limo lock. Doorman Randy Burton is perpetually on the phone to the various drivers, alerting them when a guest is ready to depart. Those who choose to make a public exit get the benefit of one last look-over by the concierge and other staff who line the lobby like wedding attendants, eyes peeled for the drooping hem, the hanging thread, the missing earring. One year, Hawkins noticed a guest had on mismatched shoes. But it turned out to be intentional. “Thank God that fashion didn’t catch on,” he says.

For an hour or two, the lobby sparkles and seethes with high formal, daring glamour and drama. Publicists are calling from the real red carpet demanding to know if this person left and when. Limousines are backed up, across the street people are shouting and shooting and the stream of stars seems endless, the finery incomparable, the act of getting them off and running an impossibility.

Then, unbelievably, the last limo pulls away, maybe a guest comes skittering down unintentionally late, or sauntering and blase. And in the sudden, strange silence, the staff lets out a collective breath.

And then it’s over

Not that it’s over. There will be calls, from the limousines, from the Kodak Theatre -- someone has forgotten her wrap, someone’s necklace just broke; during this year’s Golden Globes ceremony, one guest suddenly in the middle of dinner remembered she had forgotten to walk her dog.

Then, in the wee hours, guests trickle in, some carrying that golden statue, all keeping the room service busy until well into the morning.

And Monday is perhaps the busiest of all. Most guests are checking out, so that means hundreds of early breakfasts, a cavalcade of cabs, and three or four FedEx trucks for all the goodies that now must be shipped home. Krejci reserves another banquet room on Monday. One half is for all the dresses, tuxes and accessories that must go back, the other for the boxing up all of the gifts, including, on occasion, the little man himself.

“Oh, we’ve bubble-wrapped more than a few Oscars,” says Cairns.

Mary McNamara can be e-mailed at mary.mcnamara@latimes.com.