You are cordially invited to the Oscars after-parties ...

So you've won your Oscar and fondly believe that the night can't get any better than this. But it can, it can! For Jeff and all the other winners (and losers), it is now full steam ahead to the Vanity Fair party ...
Photograph: Danny Moloshok/Reuters

Be warned, however: the Vanity Fair party is not open to the likes of you or I. It is altogether more select than that. It is open to the likes of Katy Perry and Russell Brand ...
Photograph: Matt Baron/Rex Features

... Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony
Photograph: Danny Moloshok/Reuters

... philanthropist Barbara Davis who, judging from her finery, has taken the opportunity to be philanthropic to herself, for once
Photograph: Danny Moloshok/Reuters

And still the celebrities keep coming. Here is Christine Taylor and husband Ben Stiller ...
Photograph: Danny Moloshok/Reuters

... Danny Huston with his half-sister Angelica
Photograph: Danny Moloshok/Reuters

... TV host Jay Leno and comedian Jerry Seinfeld, the recent, scalding reviews of his latest sitcom a distant memory (either that or dulled by alcohol)
Photograph: Danny Moloshok/Reuters

And look, here's Hilary Swank, proud as punch of her mystical medallion
Photograph: Danny Moloshok/Reuters

Lauren Bacall waves merrily at all the people who stand penned behind the security cordons. It's a look that says 'So glad you're here! Now don't come any closer'
Photograph: Rich Schmitt/AFP/Getty Images

Kristen Stewart, meantime, looks a shade more circumspect. It's a look that says, 'Keep your distance. Security?'
Photograph: Danny Moloshok/Reuters

Is there no end to this parade of celebrity arrivals? Possibly not. Here is Kirk Douglas, with his wife Anne
Photograph: Danny Moloshok/Reuters

... and Natalie Portman, posing gamely against the foliage
Photograph: Danny Moloshok/Reuters

Quentin Tarantino flashes the Vs at the paparazzi. This is what we wears when, like, he doesn't care how he looks
Photograph: Danny Moloshok/Reuters

Christoph Waltz tackles the embarrasing problem of what to do with his Oscar. Leave it on the table or check it with his coat? Wife Judith Holste seems all out of ideas
Photograph: Danny Moloshok/Reuters

Music by Prudence director Roger Ross Williams has the same dilemma. How to drink, dance and mingle when your hands are occupied with a hefty golden doorstop [This caption was amended on 9 March 2010. The original identified the subject as Precious writer Geoffrey Fletcher. This has been corrected.
Photograph: Rich Schmitt/AFP/Getty Images

Has Joan Collins just teleported in? Or is she – God forbid – standing on the notorious Vanity Fair trapdoor, whereby unwelcome guests are transported tout-de-suite down an oiled chute to the nearby dumpster?
Photograph: Danny Moloshok/Reuters

Nobody, it seems, is too big and important to be spared the Vanity Fair trapdoor, should they offend the management or just out-stay their welcome. Not even Jodie Foster
Photograph: Stewart Cook/Peter Brooker/Rex Features

Not even, it transpires, one of the night's big Oscar winners. Here Sandra Bullock is coaxed into taking two steps back. Then the switch is thrown and, oops, she's out in the dumpster; an ignomonious end to a day of triumph
Photograph: Danny Moloshok/Reuters

But was the Vanity Fair bash the only game in town? Not on your nelly. There was, of course, the 18th annual Elton John Aids foundation dinner. Your hosts: Mr David Furnish and Sir Elton John, who is so overcome by the excitement of it all that he looks as though he's melting
Photograph: PA

Just check the lavishness of the 18th annual Sir Elton John Aids Foundation Dinner in Honour of the 82nd Annual Academy Awards and 62-year-old Sir Elton John (to give it its full title). It's got the Jonas brothers at it!
Photograph: PA

It's got Katie Price at it!
Photograph: PA

It plays glorious, solicitous host to Sharon Osbourne and Kelly Osbourne
Photograph: PA

And, of course, it's got Victoria Beckham too
Photograph: PA

All that's missing, it seems, is the presence of you, me and Miley Cyrus. But wait, one of these three is now showing up, fashionably late and primed to dance her arse off in the name of Aids concern. Clue: it's not you or me ...
Photograph: Gus Ruelas/Reuters