Friday night kicked off Oscar weekend with Women In Film and Perrier-Jouët Champagne holding its fifth annual Women In Film pre-Oscar reception at Cecconi’s  in West Hollywood.

The room was buzzing with Oscar talk as a number of past and present female Oscar nominees including host Gwyneth Paltrow, Viola Davis, Octavia Spencer, Jessica Chastain, and leading male nominee Demian Bichir attended and gave each other pointers on surviving the “biggest night in Hollywood”.

Other guests who attended included Gwyneth’s very talented actress mom Blythe Danner, Selena Gomez, Vanessa Hudgens, Gabourey Sidibe, Shailene Woodley, Allison Janney, Jennifer Morrison, Jena Malone, Janet McTeer, Jennfier Beals, Morgan Spurlock and Tia Carerre.

Scene & Heard:

During mom/daughter night out for Blythe and Gwyneth, the two hugged, laughed and joined nominees Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer with glasses of Perrier-Jouët Champagne.

While hanging out at the M·A·C  Cosmetics table, Selena Gomez told friends how excited she was to meet actresses from her favorite movie of the year, The Help. When Octavia Spencer arrived, Selena Gomez jumped up to introduce herself. Octavia later told the young actress “You’re so beautiful from the inside out and it shows. You just shine”.

Nominee Jessica Chastain mixed and mingled with producers and directors while eating the delectable Italian fare. She chose fruit skewers over the delicious sliders, ahi tuna, crab croquettes and other small bites.

As guests exited, they received a special gift bag that included M·A·C  Cosmetics product, hand selected by Oscar nominated makeup artist Amanda Knight (Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2), beautiful miniature bottle of Perrier-Jouët, and a complimentary class at the wildly popular SoulCycle.

Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer, chatted late in to the night helping close down the party. As they departed, they raced to get their gift bag with Octavia shouting her wish to develop her own M·A·C collection. Viola was the lucky one who received the last gift bag.