Movie stars, schmovie stars: It was the night of the Academy Awards, and all anyone wanted to do was talk to Alysa Liu.
Ms. Liu, the 20-year-old figure skater who won gold at the 2026 Olympic Games, was greeted with cheers when she arrived on Sunday at the Elton John AIDS Foundation’s annual Oscars viewing party, held in West Hollywood Park under a series of large white tents. Reporters clamored to interview her. Fans lined up to offer their congratulations.
Ms. Liu took it all in with the same mixture of enthusiasm and mild bewilderment that has been her default throughout her monthlong victory lap. She wore a trim black suit from Louis Vuitton, whose show she had attended at Paris Fashion Week a few days earlier.
“It was amazing,” she said of the fashion show, smiling broadly enough to reveal the delicate piercing that rests on her front teeth. She turned to a task as difficult as any triple axel: locating one’s seat at a sprawling dinner party. “Do you know where Table 49 is?” she asked a reporter.
With the actual Oscars taking place across town at the Dolby Theater, celebrities had gathered to watch the awards on jumbotron-size screens and raise money for Mr. John’s foundation, which works to provide treatment to people living with H.I.V. and confront stigma around the AIDS epidemic.
The rock star sat at the center of the room, flanked by Dua Lipa and Donatella Versace and just a few seats away from Tina Knowles and Billie Jean King. In a brief speech, Mr. John told the crowd that he had been experiencing difficulties with his eyesight, but that he was determined to hold the event for a 34th time.
“Throughout the years we’ve raised a lot of money — I think $125 million since the start of it — which has gone toward my wardrobe that I wear tonight,” he joked. He left the rest of the announcing to his husband, David Furnish, and the event co-hosts Neil Patrick Harris and David Burtka.
Keke Palmer, who wore a vintage Yves Saint Laurent bustier and leather beret, checked out some of the items up for auction that night: a hot pink bodysuit of Dua Lipa’s, a series of nude photographs by Peter Hujar, a Rocketman-themed pinball machine.
Ms. Palmer said she hoped that the Oscars would honor Ryan Coogler’s film about blues, vampires and the Jim Crow South. “Really loved ‘Sinners’ — really loved it,” she said.
Fran Drescher, who plays the mother of an abrasive table tennis player in “Marty Supreme,” said she had left the real Academy Awards ceremony partway through to come to Mr. John’s watch party. “I feel an obligation to him, to support him,” she said. “He takes his celebrity and applies it to the greater good.”
The party was one of several glittery options on Oscar night. There is also the Governors Ball, which is the official Oscars after-party, and a star-studded party thrown by Vanity Fair. (It went through major shake-ups this year, including a new location and tighter restrictions on press access.) Madonna and her manager Guy Oseary also host an even more private after-party in Coldwater Canyon.
But many guests said Mr. John’s event was special. “This is the only Oscar party where you can watch the show, enjoy dinner and casually sit three tables away from the gayest person you’ve ever met,” Mr. Harris told the crowd toward the beginning of the evening.
Patricia Arquette praised the foundation’s work to fight AIDS in a political climate that is increasingly hostile to H.I.V. treatment and prevention. In recent months, nearly 20 states have moved to limit access to H.I.V. treatment programs; the Trump administration also terminated a $258 million program that was working toward an H.I.V. vaccine. The event raised $10.6 million for the foundation — a considerable sum even for a star-filled fund-raiser.
“It’s a very scary time for L.G.B.T.Q.I.A. people,” Ms. Arquette said. “We’re hearing from people that their pharmacies are no longer offering PrEP to stop the spread of H.I.V., and not offering their H.I.V. medications anymore. That’s their life-support system.”
Guests picked at braised short ribs and branzino fillets while watching as Paul Thomas Anderson’s “One Battle After Another” collected six Oscars, including best picture. After the telecast had concluded, the recent Grammy Award winner Lola Young took the stage to perform a set of her hits, including the song “Messy.”
As the evening wore down, film buffs talked about which moments of the telecast had stuck with them, like the rare tie between two live-action shorts, “Two People Exchanging Saliva” and “The Singers.”
But for Sheryl Lee Ralph, the unparalleled highlight of the awards had been the moment Michael B. Jordan won best actor for his work in “Sinners.” She said she would remember “the way the audience stood up and roared with applause, the way they were pushing him forward.”
“And when he got up there,” she continued, “the way he thanked his mother.”
Callie Holtermann reports on style and pop culture for The Times.
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