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The Hype

TIFF Talk

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TIFF after hours: the 44 (and counting) film fest venues with the coveted 4 a.m. last call

(Image: walknboston)

Every year celebs from all over the world flood into the city for TIFF, but for many, it’s the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario that’s the real star throughout the month of September. Just in time to combat post-summer blues, the AGCO grants certain venues the rights to the elusive 4 a.m. last call. While last year’s list clocked in at 44 venues This year’s list of venues with extended hours finally caught up with last year’s, bringing the current number to 44—some of them not open to the public (we’re looking at you, Windsor Arms) and others open for one night only. Check out the list of late-night watering holes after the jump and stay tuned for updates on extended hours, as more are expected to roll in before the festival.

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The Hype

TIFF Talk

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The annual list of celeb-inspired TIFF cocktails is out (with nary a Canadian to be seen)

The Skyy Wilde Ginger, Skyy Lively Temptress and Skyy Feelin’ Fiennes

Two weeks away from the start of the Toronto International Film Festival, official sponsor Skyy Vodka kicked things off with its annual pre-festival fête, this year at an appropriately swanky Forest Hill home, to reveal their celebrity-themed cocktails. In previous years, the cocktails have honoured Canadians like Ellen Page and Jay Baruchel but, sadly, this time around north-of-the-49th celebs like Sarah Polley and Ryan Gossling didn’t make the drink list. Here are a few drinks to sip on while scoping out the festival scene or drowning your nationalistic sorrow.

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The Dish

From the Print Edition

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Best of the City 2011: Five top spots for a delicious drink

Best of the City: Drinks

(Image: Christopher Stevenson)

Rooftop drink Cocktail class Ice Blood orange margarita Wine by the glass

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The Hype

From the Print Edition

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The Secret Life of a Bay Street Hooker

The X-rated trade secrets of a Bay Street call girl. She’s sophisticated, smart and open minded. She meets her clients at Le Germain or the Hazelton and gives them what they want.

The Secret Life of a Bay Street Hooker

On an unseasonably warm evening in October, Chloë Marcelle decided to walk to work. Her slim figure encased in a silk blouse, silver-speckled Chanel leather skirt, net stockings and black silk Manolos, she left her apartment and strolled through the downtown core to her favourite boutique hotel, Le Germain on Mercer Street.

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The Goods

Shop Talk

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For $12 million, you can name this pink diamond after yourself

It even outshines the competition

After the joy of rolling around in a pile of $100 bills wore off, we started wondering what to do with our millions—extreme wealth can be so tiresome. That’s why we were thrilled to find out that Canada’s largest pink diamond will be auctioned off next month in Toronto. It’s expected to fetch between $8 and $12 million, but here’s why that’s a steal:

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The Hype

TIFF Talk

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Q&A with Carey Mulligan: Fighting with Keira Knightley, working with Ryan Gosling and eavesdropping on moviegoers

Carey Mulligan at the TIFF premiere for Never Let Me Go. (Image: Jeff Vespa/Wire Image/Getty Images)

In Never Let Me Go, she’s the plain, overlooked member of a love triangle (the others are real-life friend Keira Knightley and Andrew “New Spider-Man” Garfield), but off-screen, Carey Mulligan is a showstopper. The 25-year-old, who was a first-time Oscar nominee after last year’s TIFF hit An Education, walks into a suite at the Park Hyatt with a chic bleached-blond layered cut and TV-ready makeup that makes her look more like the movie star she is than the girls next door she usually plays. During a round-table interview, the London-born actress shows she a starlet with definite ideas about where her career is heading. Specifically, it’s heading into the role of a late-20s Latina in a Ryan Gosling movie. Maybe it’s better if Carey explains—the full interview, after the jump.

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The Hype

TIFF Talk

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Where to get a TIFF drink: the film festival’s 44 spots with 4 a.m. licences

The arrival of TIFF always demands answers to three crucial questions: which celebs are coming to town, what are the best flicks to see, and where can we get inebriated at ungodly hours of the night? The first two we’ve taken care of here and here, and now we have the nearly complete list of venues with extended hours for TIFF. The news is good: last year, around 25 bars and restaurants were approved for extended hours; this year, about 44 will be serving late. The selection is more varied, and with spots like Gabby’s and Hey Lucy on the list, it’s decidedly more casual. The Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario tells us that the list could expand as more venues get last-minute approval. Here, the 44 bars officially licensed to stay open until 4 a.m. »

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The Hype

TIFF Talk

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Are the doomsayers right? Is it the end for Yorkville as TIFF epicentre?

The mean streets of King West (Image: Google Maps)

With the Bell Lightbox TIFF headquarters at King and John finished, doomsayers have begun predicting the demise of Yorkville as the festival epicentre. The new Lightbox—with its five screening rooms, festival programming and trendy new restaurants—is obviously going to provide Yorkville’s facilities with some competition. It’s also across from the Hyatt Regency, the official host hotel, and very close to the Thompson Hotel, where Shenae Grimes, Adrian Grenier and Enrique Iglesias have been spotted recently.

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The Hype

From the Print Edition

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From the Archives: a look back on TIFF’s most memorable moments

Oh, Snap
This month, the Toronto International Film Festival celebrates its 35th year with a glossy new home in the Bell Lightbox. Much has changed since the inaugural year, when Hollywood studios turned up their noses at the fledging fest. Then again, much hasn’t. It’s still two weeks of celebrities and fans behaving badly. Here, a look back on TIFF’s most memorable moments, from the coke-fuelled ’70s to the paparazzi-riddled oughties.

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The Dish

From the Print Edition

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Fisherman’s Friends: Chris Nuttall-Smith reviews Maléna and The Atlantic

The season’s most anticipated openings are two seafood-centric spots

Maléna at Av and Dav (Image: Ryan Szulc)

Toronto is a raw bar town. We’re over-served by excellent oyster houses, and we probably consume more sushi per capita than any city east of Vancouver. But cooked fish is a problem here; we’ve never had a standout seafood spot. This spring, Nathan Isberg, of Czehoski and Coca fame, opened what early adopters described as a nose-to-tail disciple’s take on the life aquatic on Dundas West. And in Yorkville, a neighbourhood that’s desperate for a few more decent places to eat, front-of-house kings David Minicucci and Sam Kalogiros launched Maléna, a flashy fish spot. It looked like Toronto might finally turn into a seafood town.

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The Dish

Restauran-TO

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Get outside: Toronto’s 10 best patios

The patio season started early this year, which simply means there’s more time to hit the city’s best al fresco dining and drinking destinations. Here, 10 of our favourites »

Toronto International Film Festival 2009

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The TIFFing point: last night at 9 p.m., the film fest ended in spirit, if not in fact

We regret to inform you that TIFF‘s party circuit is dead. The knell sounded just before 9 p.m. last night, on a quiet Yorkville Avenue, and it sounded a lot like cougars shrieking. Sure enough, up stumbled a terribly lush twosome. One was big and tall, with badly dyed blond hair and a suspiciously crumpled Holts bag (all the better to stow her flip-flops, we guessed). The other squeezed more easily into her Costa Blanca duds, but by the same token, seemed less able to handle her Jager shots. “Hey you guys! Are you gunna party all niiiight?” shrieked the lightweight into the street. She then added, redundantly, “We’re so wasted.”

With a helpless shudder, we realized: she’s going to talk to us.

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Toronto International Film Festival 2009

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50 Cent was performing on a roof but all we got was a leer from Harvey Weinstein

We would have expected the Vanity Fair party, at the Hazelton Hotel’s One, to be ripe with top-tier talent but instead there was only a white-haired Graydon Carter, the Canadian editor-in-chief of the magazine, and bushy eyebrowed Michael Budman, founder of Roots. Tweets tell us that Amy Poehler was there earlier. The DJ had an impressive set list but everyone was too blasé or depleted to dance. Most impressive part of the event? A 15-litre bottle of Moet and Chandon chilling on ice.

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Toronto International Film Festival 2009

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TIFF weekend round-up: the top 10 stories from the Toronto International Film Festival, September 11 to 13

ROUND-UP

Photo by Karon Liu

1. We chat with George Clooney at the Men Who Stare at Goats after party on the Bridle Path

2. Jennifer Connelly is torn apart by bigwig exec but exacts her revenge flawlessly

3. Of all places: was George Clooney dining at Jack Astor’s?

4. Michael Douglas watches sports more than movies; is not a fan of ‘MyFace’ or Twitter

5. Perez Hilton tells us why TIFF is better than Cannes and how he is happy that Drew Barrymore and Ellen Page are making out

6. Q&A with Hugh Hefner: the patron saint of Viagra is featured in a new Canadian documentary

7. “Anti-TIFF” party at Lo’La delivers old-time Hollywood with flair

8. Mena Suvari spent most of the Vitamin Water party playing with goats

9. Sook-Yin Lee demands party guests share an orgasm story

10. We don’t care about the young folks: the Park Hyatt is overrun with stargazing 20-somethings in short skirts

Toronto International Film Festival 2009

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We don’t care about the young folks: the Park Hyatt is overrun with stargazing 20-somethings

image010

Bored of the dance: many seemed exasperated with the deluge of short-skirted 20-somethings in Yorkville (Photo by Jen McNeely)

Did Gossip Girl put out an APB directing all 19-year-old girls from the GTA to the Park Hyatt roof? The hotel has been so inundated with stargazers that metal fences are required to block the driveway at night and elevators are crammed with intoxicated 20-somethings vying for a lewd stare from any Hollywood hunk. We managed to squeeze through the human wall (thanks to National Post’s Shinan Govani) and bypass the party crashers to get a glimpse of the hoopla at the Hyatt’s Nikki Beach. Drew Barrymore was sitting pretty on the patio, but a somewhat stunned Elijah Wood was seemingly scared off by the masses of miniskirts and lipstick-stained teeth.

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