Live from inside the press conference

Who are all these people?

As the Golden Globes ceremony is replaced by a glorified news conference this evening, the normally tightly regulated and highly organized event has given way to ... controlled chaos?

There aren't the usual seating assignments, except for some people who don't look at all familIar -- and seem to be an average of 80 years old. Are they all Hollywood Foreign Press Assn. members? Whoever they are, they're hogging up the tables. There are plenty of reporters who also don't look familiar to the regulars covering the awards season. But the atmosphere is giddy if a bit nutty.

And there's food, so there's that.

Longtime HFPA member Jack Tewksbury, seated in the main ballroom minutes before the press conference began, said -- and he said it seriously, without a hint of humor or sarcasm: "It still has a patina of glamour, doesn't it?"

He added: "Of course, we were hoping stars would show up, but as you can see, no," then pointed to the ballroom packed with media and absolutely no sign of star wattage whatsoever. Next year, he said assuredly, "I'm sure it will be a super affair."

So how wacky of a night is it shaping up to be?

Well, the "civilians" are now the celebrities. Just look inside the Beverly Hilton Hotel bar: There, said civilians -- the ones without a job in the entertainment industry or a press credential dangling around their necks -- are all being interviewed by journalists who have nothing else for their notebooks on this Golden Globes night.

The ratio of reporters to citizenry is worse than Iowa a few Tuesdays ago.

A crew of die-hard fans lingered in the lobby waiting in vain (so far) for stars to show up. For over a decade, Janice Osborne of Arlington, Texas, has been coming to the Golden Globes each year to see celebrities, and they were not going to make an exception this year, ceremony or no ceremony.

Said her daughter, Erin Norris: "We were very disappointed when we found out it wasn't happening. This has been planned for months," she said.

The only bold-faced name they've seen during their trip is Vanessa Williams, "at lunch at The Farm" restaurant in Beverly Hills, she added.

Moira Fraser, a travel coordinator for the British military, was already on a flight from her home in Scotland to the United States when she found out the Golden Globes ceremony had been canceled and replaced by a glorified press conference.

But she came out anyway Sunday, just as she has for the last seven years. "We just decided to come and make the most of it," she said.