Celebrities, onlookers mingle at the opening night of the Sarasota Film Festival

SARASOTA -- From acclaimed directors and major Hollywood stars to local filmmakers introducing their first short films, everyone was thrilled to be on the red carpet outside the Sarasota Opera House Friday.

And no one was more thrilled than Michael Dunaway.

"I kind of feel like I got the key to go backstage at Disney World," Dunaway said.

Dunaway is a filmmaker, the movie editor for the online magazine Paste, and a long-time fan of the Sarasota Film Festival.

He's also in his first year as the festival's director of programming, so he's experiencing it from a new perspective this year.

The festival kicked off Friday evening with the red-carpet event at the Opera House, with a crowd of film-lovers packing the sidewalk and spilling out into the street.

It was a new location for the opening-night festivities, which in recent years have been held at the Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall.

Probably the biggest names who worked their way down the carpet were actor Ben Vereen and writer-director Oren Moverman. Their film, "Time Out of Mind," had been selected as the opening-night film.

There had been rumors that the film's star and producer, Richard Gere, would make an appearance, but it turned out he was out of the country working on a new film.

Also on the carpet was Nick Sandow of "Orange Is the New Black." He's one of the stars, and one of he writers of a film called "Houses" that will have its world premiere at the festival Saturday.

"It's a celebration of the creative process," Sandow said of "Houses."

Jenner Furst, who directed and co-wrote "Houses," was attending his first Sarasota Film Festival, but said he had heard great buzz about the festival within the national independent film community.

"The Sarasota Film Festival's known as place that pays attention to films that have been overlooked by the big festivals," Furst said. "Sarasota's great about looking outside of the box."

Even though it was his first time at the festival, Furst said he knows the Sarasota area well, His grandmother, sister and parents have all lived in Sarasota at various times.

"I've been coming here once a year since I was a little kid," he said.

After about an hour of celebrities and new filmmakers smiling, chatting and posing on the red carpet, the crowd moved inside for the 6:30 p.m. screening of "Time Out of Mind."

The Opera House was filled to capacity, which meant some people who were waiting outside with standby tickets went away disappointed.

Before the film were the usual series of short speeches by festival officials and other dignitaries. ("I guess I have to write a speech," SFF president Mark Famiglio said before he walked into the Opera House.)

Famiglio started by telling the audience that Friday was the seventh birthday of his twin daughters. And since he had to spend part of their seventh birthday away from them, he pulled out his phone and asked the crowd to sing "Happy Birthday" to them -- which, of course, the crowd did.

Famiglio introduced Dunaway, who thanked Famiglio for giving him his "dream job." Dunaway then introduced Moverman, calling him "one of my favorite directors in the world."

Moverman addressed the rumors about Gere attending. He said he had spoken to Gere earlier in the day, and that the actor asked him to apologize to Sarasota that he couldn't be there.

"I told him that on behalf of the good people of Sarasota, we do not accept his apology," Moverman said. "He owes you a visit."

Moverman talked about how "Time Out of Mind," the character study of a homeless man, had been a project that Gere had wanted to do for 12 years.

He then introduced Vereen, who plays another homeless man in the film.

Vereen took the stage, hands clasped, and bowed several times to the applauding crowd. When the applause died down, he gave the evening's shortest speech:

"Can we watch the movie now?"

Marty Clear, features writer/columnist, can be reached at 941-708-7919. Follow twitter.com/martinclear.

This story was originally published April 11, 2015 at 12:00 AM with the headline "Celebrities, onlookers mingle at the opening night of the Sarasota Film Festival ."