Ever thought about going to one of Hollywood’s big awards shows? You know, getting all duded up and walking the red carpet with the most famous movie and music stars in the world? Rubbing elbows at the after-parties, high-fiving the winners and hugging it out with the poor losers?

Sure, you have. Well, Bluefish Concierge can make your dream come true. For a price.

Steve Sims, CEO of the 12-year-old international corporation, has seen his business skyrocket in the past decade. Today, you name the exclusive event, celeb-strewn party or hot international designer fashion show and he can probably get you in.

Sims claims to have sold tickets to top awards shows, with prices ranging from $2,500 for back row seats to $120,000 for front row spots amid the award winners.

But seats are just the start.

Timing, it seems, is still everything.

Anyone who has seen "Pride & Prejudice" knows Joe Wright's Oscar-buzzing adaptation is a far cry from the novel's previously polite, well-corseted cinematic incarnations.

And the credit goes to Wright and costume designer Jacqueline Durran ("Lara Croft: Tomb Raider," "Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones," Topsy-Turvy"). "Joe really wanted to make the young girls feel modern and accessible," says Durran. "And it was easier to do that because we weren't tied to period details."

Seems Wright set the Way Back Machine to move his film closer to Jane Austen's original 1813 "Prejudice" publication date, when women's fashion was neither tightly corseted, hoop-skirted nor big-bustled.

Austen's female characters wore what the author wore — Regency style — much looser, freer, more comfortable dresses with lower waistlines and shorter hemlines; perfect for trudging through muddy fields, as Elizabeth Bennet and, one imagines, Austen herself was wont to do.

And no fancy duds for the poor Bennet family. "We wanted the clothes to express the simple, rural country life of the Bennets. We knew their clothes were either made in the village or at home and always hand-me-downs. Unlike in past films, they're seen as a family living on the brink of poverty in the middle of nowhere which makes the marriage situation even more important to the family's survival."

As for the film's ground-breaking, "muddy hem" costumes, Durran had assistants that kept the Bennet girls' gowns in dirty disarray. "We did let the girls tromp about in the costumes for that authentic grimy living-in-the-country look. But if you keep letting the costumes get dirtier and dirtier, it would have ruined the continuity."

So let's refresh. Back in Austen's time, rebellious young girls got their own dresses dirty by walking through muddy fields. Now rebellious young girls pay a fortune to wear pre-worn, torn and tattered dirty jeans. How's that for progress?

Photo: Keira Knightley, as Elizabeth Bennet, takes a muddy stroll in "Pride & Prejudice."
(Alex Bailey / Focus Features)

So what's Keira Knightley like to work with?

"She is absolutely delightful, very down-to-earth and totally un-starry, " says "Pride and Prejudice" costumer designer Jacqueline Durran. "And she was always very interested in her costumes, as all good actresses are. She would often discuss the moods and emotions that were building up in her character and relate the dresses to various scenes. Every dress had a lot of meaning to her performance."

So what did Keira keep? No gowns, thank you very much. Durran says the ever-practical actress only hung on to "a pair of boots."

Thank heavens. That leaves more for us to admire when the "Pride" costumes go on display at the 14th Annual Art of Motion Picture Costume Design Exhibit at the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising, 919 S. Grand Ave., Los Angeles. Feb. 6 to April 29, 2006 (Mon.-Sat., 10 a.m.-4 p.m.).

Is Charlize Theron going ga-ga for Gucci?

The Oscar winning “Monster” actress has certainly been wearing a lot of Gucci gowns this year. She's already chosen Gucci for some of her “North Country” premieres, wore their dresses to the Hollywood Film Festival awards and to accept the Icon Award at Premiere magazine's Women in Hollywood dinner.

Theron even showed up in green Gucci last week for the design house’s fashion show fund-raiser for the Children’s Action Network at the home of Eva and Michael Chow.

And remember she already went gung ho for Gucci at the 76th Oscars when she wore that slinky sexy beaded gown with her '20s style bobbed hair.

What does this bode? Too soon to tell. But keep watching the carpets.

Photo: Charlize Theron goes for the green, Gucci, that is, at the Children's Action Network fundraiser.
(Steve Granitz / WireImage)

In "Good Night, and Good Luck," David Strathairn portrays Edward R. Murrow, the legendary broadcast journalist who takes on and publicly exposes Sen. Joseph McCarthy's Red Scare tactics. And there are many who feel Strathairn deserves major award nods for this challenging and inspiring role.

Strathairn's next project is another black-and-white political period piece with vintage footage, "The Notorious Bettie Page," which is currently screening to long-lead press and due in theaters in April 2006.

In the story of the perky Pin Up Queen's rise and fall, Gretchen Mol nails Page's husky Southern drawl and good girl innocence. Imitation of Christ designer Tara Subkoff plays one of Page's pin-up pals, Sarah Paulson is marvelous as Miami photographer Bunny Yeager and Lili Taylor plays New York photographer Irving Klaw's sister, Paula.

But this time Strathairn is closer to McCarthy than Murrow.

In fact, it's unsettling to watch the lean actor, now being feted for fighting the evil right wingers in "Good Luck," so deftly portraying the puritanical Sen. Estes Kefauver, who led an investigation from 1954 to 1955 into the impact of comic books and pornography on juvenile delinquency.

The hearings turned Page into the most notorious sex icon of her time because porn was just as feared as Commies back then. As one of Kefauver's cronies intones: "Communism will never defeat America. That comes from within."

Too bad "Good Luck" didn't also have some of Page's scintillatingly sweet pin-up posing scenes. Now that would have made the academy really sit up and take notice.

Photo Credit: No, this is not David Strathairn. It's Gretchen Mol, posing as the infamous pin-up Bettie Page in "The Notorious Bettie Page." Trust us, this is way better. Strathairn as Sen. Estes Kefauver looks like Edward R. Murrow, sans smoke and cigarette.

"CSI: Miami" star Emily Procter was admiring the red carpet-worthy gowns at the Escada Spring 2006 fashion show fundraiser she hosted for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital at Meson G in Hollywood Thursday.

The well-attended cocktail evening — Amber Valletta, "Lost" star Maggie Grace, Amy Smart, "Grey's Anatomy" star Katherine Heigl, "Nip/Tuck" star Kelly Carlson and January Jones — was part of Escada's early Hollywood outreach to place their couture-quality gowns on nominees and presenters for the upcoming SAG, Globe, Guild and Oscar carpets.

When not admiring the informally modeled designs, Procter talked about her new film, "Big Momma's House 2", opening Jan. 27. Seems the spunky blonde had to do a buncha time sittin' around the set with her in-full-out-drag co-star Martin Lawrence, who disguises himself as Big Momma again to go undercover in a murder investigation.

"There's always a lot of waiting on any movie set," says Procter. "So some days Martin and I would be sitting there together for hours and I just felt so comfortable with him that I'd talk to him about everything, just like we were really good girl friends.

Finally, one day he just looked at me and said, 'Emily, you do realize that I'm not a woman.'

"I said, 'Of course, I do, Martin. But, well, you just look so pretty.'"

Photo: Emily Procter, Jonathan Silverman and Jennifer Finnigan at the Escada fashion show/cocktail party fundraiser for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital at Meson G.
(Amy Graves / Wire Image)

Keira Knightley is winning raves for her portrayal of Elizabeth Bennet in "Pride and Prejudice." And she's also getting major kudos for her elegant style statements on the red carpets, both at the L.A. premiere of "Domino" (wearing vintage Missoni) and the "Pride" New York premiere last week.

But even a spirited and stunning actress can be tripped up by a wardrobe malfunction. Knightley was reportedly posing at the New York "Pride" preem when her gorgeous red satin Calvin Klein dress faltered ever so slightly.

The bodice reportedly slipped just enough to show off a bit the actress' left breast. Oh, dear. Not another Nipplegate. The Associated Press reported that photographers just snapped away and no one told her what happened. Hey, now Keira knows how Tara Reid felt.

Revealing photos of her "flasher" incident can be found on the Internet but we seriously doubt Knightley cares about such limited overexposure.

After all, she bared a breast in the October issue of Esquire. And she has also revealed that she bargained with "Domino" director Tony Scott on what she would expose in the film: She was willing to surrender two boobs, but refused to show her butt.

"I'm a woman, there's no reason to it," she's explained. We're with ya on that, Keira.

Photo: Keira Knightley's provocative pose (no, not the revealing shot) at the New York premiere of "Pride and Prejudice."
(Dimitrios Kambouris / WireImage)

We're keeping a very close eye on Reese Witherspoon's designer choices leading up to the big awards season. And so far, the girl is positively golden.

Witherspoon didn't miss a beat at the New York premiere of her new film, "Walk the Line," where she wore a heart-stopping bright red Carolina Herrera frock with a black headband, black pumps and a dramatically oversized black bow belt.

It's true that on any other actress a bow this big might look like Barnum & Bailey circus clown material. But on Witherspoon, it works. No one knows why.

Some women just have an innate ability to wear weird stuff like this and look like its the most natural thing in the world to have a bow bigger than their head wrapped around their waist.

Photo: Reese Witherspoon gives great bow at the New York "Walk the Line" premiere.
(Jemal Countess / WireImage)

Chris "Ludacris" Bridges did some pretty fast explaining in response to the controversy he created at the 2005 VIBE Awards. Apparently, the blogs were burning up with irate posts. So for everyone out there who was angered by the artist's decision to wear a Confederate flag on his jacket during his performance of Ray Charles' classic, "Georgia," here's the explanation from his his website:

"The discussions that have been sparked after my performance of 'Georgia' at the 2005 VIBE Awards is my exact reason for wearing a depiction of the Confederate Flag. This flag represents the oppression that we as African Americans have endured for years; this is a symbol of segregation and the racism that reigned not only throughout the South but throughout the entire United States. "I wore it to represent where we came from, to remind people that Ray Charles' original 'Georgia' was written because of that racism." Actually Ludacris, Hoagy Carmichael and Stuart Gorrell wrote the song, and as far as I know it has nothing to do with racism.

"At the end of the performance, I removed and stomped on the flag to reveal my version of the flag; a flag comprised of black, red and green. Those are the colors of Africa. It is a representation and my interpretation of where we were and where we need to go. Racism is just as prevalent now and if we are not constantly mindful of our history and take charge of it; history is destined to repeat itself because of ignorance. In order to move forward, we must never forget where we were.

"I hope people continue to question and challenge authority, media and themselves because questioning and challenging can only lead to enlightenment."

Thanks for the clarification. As to the other deluge of questions about why the awards show was so boring, we have no idea.

We've discovered secret documents revealing Warner Bros.' Oscar and Globes campaign strategy for the latest installment of their "Harry Potter" franchise.

"If you fell in love with him in 'The English Patient,' you'll die for him in 'Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.'"

Okay, it's a stretch. But there really should be a way the studio can take advantage of the link between the two films: acclaimed British actor Ralph Fiennes.

Lord Voldemort, sorry, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, finally makes his grand, sweeping, cauldron bubbling, wand-exploding, in-the-flesh appearance in "Goblet." And if the deliciously malevolent Dark Lord seems eerily familiar to fans of the Oscar-winning epic, "Patient," it's with good reason.

Fiennes, who burns up the screen as the evil Voldemort, played the ill-fated pilot-patient in the film adaptation of Michael Ondaatje's novel.

In "Goblet," Voldemort's freakish face — created by the film's creature effects supervisor Nick Dudman — is glistening, tissue-thin skin with bubbling veins, stretched over Fiennes' skull.

In other words, Voldemort looks just like Fiennes' disfigured "English Patient" pilot would have if his silly nurse had taken the poor chap to a decent burn unit to get skin grafts.

Photo: Ralph Fiennes, right, mock-attacks Daniel Radcliffe at the New York premiere of "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire."
(Dimitrios Kambouris / WireImage)