Spirits were high, dresses were poofy, and Hollywood’s biggest stars were ready to pose on Saturday night as they arrived at the fifth Academy Museum Gala.
George Clooney, Jeremy Allen White and Sydney Sweeney were among the many actors who walked the powder-blue carpet, a nod to the museum’s current exhibition on Steven Spielberg’s Oscar-winning 1975 film “Jaws.” Kim Kardashian appeared with her face covered, wearing a nude, corseted dress from Maison Margiela, and Hailey Bieber wore a sculptural, strapless, brown and nude Schiaparelli gown.
The museum, conceived to celebrate cinema as an art form, is a venture of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which hosts the Oscars. This year’s gala honored the actors Penélope Cruz and Bowen Yang, the filmmaker Walter Salles and the rocker Bruce Springsteen, who closed out the evening with a performance of his songs “Streets of Philadelphia,” “Atlantic City” and “Land of Hope and Dreams.”
“It’s our biggest fund-raiser of the year,” said Amy Homma, the director and president of the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures. “All of the work that goes into the past year, we get to celebrate tonight.”
The evening raised more than $12 million, Ms. Homma said, a record for the museum, which opened in 2021 and, like many Hollywood productions, has endured its share of snags and critiques. But the stars who are used to the award show circuit and galas still arrived with enthusiasm — and the occasional movie recommendation.
“I love this place,” the actor Jeff Goldblum said. “I love everything they’re doing. I’m crazy about movies, and we know how this place supports and champions movies.”
Mr. Goldblum said he had recently enjoyed Ari Aster’s “Eddington,” Robert Eggers’s “Nosferatu” and Benny Safdie’s “The Smashing Machine.”
After blue-carpet photos, attendees, who included members of the Academy, spent a few hours at a pop-up cocktail bar outside the museum’s entrance, sipping on a signature drink called the Amity Island, a citrusy tequila cocktail with a hibiscus-cranberry float named after the fictional setting of “Jaws.”
Over the past several years, the museum has featured exhibitions on the work of popular directors including Spike Lee, Pedro Almodóvar and Bong Joon Ho, whose current exhibition at the museum highlights his creative process for films like “Parasite” (2019), which won the Oscar for best picture in 2020, and Okja (2017).
“It’s a great honor that my exhibition is here,” Mr. Bong said, praising the curators, “I love their work.”
Naturally, a bit of Oscar buzz loomed over the event, with chatter about the season’s potential front-runners. Recent hits like Ryan Coogler’s “Sinners,” Zach Cregger’s “Weapons” and Paul Thomas Anderson’s “One Battle After Another” popped up in many conversations.
“Just two days ago, I went and saw ‘One Battle After Another’ for the second time in theaters,” the actress Anna Kendrick said as she sipped on a glass of wine next to the actress Michelle Monaghan. “And I’m not lying when I say, seeing it for a second time made me want to see it for a third time.”
Attendees snacked on bite-size taro-root tacos, tiny beef kofta sliders and slices of pizza topped with honeynut squash and prosciutto.
Some hadn’t had a chance to watch all of the year’s big releases. The actress Brenda Song and her partner, the actor Macaulay Culkin, said that with two young children at home, it was pretty tricky to block off two uninterrupted hours.
“What we’re watching is, like, ‘The Lego Movie,’” Ms. Song said.
“Yes, on repeat,” Mr. Culkin added, laughing.
The pop stars Charli XCX, Olivia Rodrigo and Addison Rae floated around the room alongside actors like George Clooney and Kerry Washington, and the Netflix executive Ted Sarandos. Even with the starry crowd, many attendees were quick to shed inhibitions.
“I got my shoes off because my feet were hurting,” the actor LaKeith Stanfield said, walking through the event in his socks. “I put them in the coat check.”
As staff members clinked knives against glasses of champagne to usher attendees toward their seats for a gala dinner held on the museum’s terrace, the actress Rachel Zegler shared two new movies that she adored. Though many of the films’ stars weren’t present, she dutifully pitched their importance for next year’s Oscars.
“Oh my gosh, ‘One Battle After Another’ and ‘Kiss of the Spider Woman’ are so fantastic,” Ms. Zegler said referring to the films starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lopez.
“J. Lo’s Oscar campaign begins now.”
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