Whatever. The point is that for a long, long time I wanted to be the movie star who wears the expensive clothes, signs autographs and travels in limousines. I wanted to hang out with other famous people and spend my days making movies...and eat ice cream and stay up past 8:30pm to watch Knight Rider. And, most of all, I wanted to go to the Academy Awards.

As an adult I came to realise that being a movie star isn't all it's cracked up to be. Open any trashy magazine and you find yourself reading about Winona Ryder's kleptomania, Tara Reid's alcoholism, Ben Affleck's gambling issues, Robert Downey Jr's battle with cocaine, Halle Belle's sex-addicted spouse, J-Lo's marriage obsession, Mary-Kate Olsen's anorexia and Kirsty Alley's skyrocketing weight problem.

And far from having perfect physiques, every week there are new photos published of "stars without make-up" when we get to see last week's "world's most beautiful people" sporting bad skin, botched facelifts, over-inflated lips, bald heads and hail-damaged thighs.

Which means you go to bed knowing two things:

   1.) Famous people are actually normal, flawed human beings whose lives are far from ideal;
   2.) Liz Hurley, Meg Ryan and Lara Flynn-Boyle may have cool clothes and more money than you but they also happen to look like trout in drag.

None of that means that you don't still dream of going to the Oscars and experience a bit of the fun. But how do you get to go to the Oscars without first sleeping with Jack Nicholson? Good question and I happen to have the answer.

You go to the Oscars on the Gold Coast. Since 1995, the managing director of Rossi Casting, Damien Anthony Rossi, has been hosting his annual Rossi's Oscars Bash.

The inaugural event featured 50 guests, a small TV and some homemade sausage rolls at Rossi's Milton Casting Studios. A decade later and the event is officially known as the "Q.L.D. Group's Rossi's Oscars at the Palazzo!" and with 500 people expected to attend, it is said to be the biggest Academy Awards celebration in Australia.

Each year, Rossi's party takes its theme from one of the best-picture nominees. This year's theme, "Millionaires and Billionaires", pays tribute to the two films tipped to take home the most gold: Million Dollar Baby (Clint Eastwood's engrossing drama about a female boxer) and The Aviator (the story of eccentric billionaire Howard Hughes).

And just when you thought the event was totally hedonistic, Rossi's website says its purpose is not only to celebrate the local and international film industry but also to raise money for cancer research.