Film festivals aren’t for the faint of heart

Only three more work days until Sundance . Which means that I take off for Park City, Utah, on Thursday morning. This will be the seventh year that I’ve walked among the elite of America’s independent film industry, and I still get nervous before I go.

Not because I run into any celebrities, though that happens. I once stood in line to buy tickets for a film and chatted with Seattle native Christopher McDonald . So, OK, he’s not such a big star. But other than once sitting three rows in front of Uma Thurman and her now-estranged husband Ethan Hawke, and getting to ask Benicio Del Toro a question during a press conference, I’ve never gotten any closer to anyone recognizable.

No, I get nervous because it’s so busy. The lines are long , the buses are packed, tickets are hard to come by, the pace is fast and time is short. And I always feel as if I need to be going to one more movie, attending one more press screening or conference , seeing if I can crash one more midnight party. I don’t get a lot of sleep.

Feel sorry for me, don’t you?