Seen & heard at 2011 Screen Actors Guild Awards

Backstage after accepting her SAG Award for actress in a leading role for “Black Swan,” Natalie Portman faced a throng of especially vocal photographers in the photo pool room. She remained composed, steely even. One by one they yelled out to her.

“Natalie! Mazel tov!” said one photographer.

“Golden Globes! SAG! Way to go!” said another, referring to her Golden Globes win two weeks ago.

“Natalie, go out with me!” yelled another, sticking out his tongue -- a bit odd, considering she recently announced her engagement to her “Black Swan” choreographer Benjamin Millepied and is pregnant.

“Hopefully the baby can’t hear any of this!” she said to an assistant, apparently forgetting she had just used an expletive during her acceptance speech.

As she attempted to make her getaway, she was cornered by a TV crew from Extra, who seemingly were trying to engage in some product placement for Apple products.

First they asked Portman if her fiancee was nearby. When she answered in the negative, the talking head waved a phone at her, and asked, “Do you want to call him? We have phones here!”

Portman giggled uncomfortably, and then a woman from Extra whipped out a cellphone and proceeded to pull up old pictures of Portman as a kid.

“What’s this one? I’ve never seen you look like this,” the woman said.

“Yeah, I think that’s from high school,” said Portman politely, but obviously eager to get away.

-- Deborah Vankin and Jessica Gelt  (Lionel Hahn / Los Angeles Times / MCT)

Steve Buscemi hung back, almost shy, as the cast of “Boardwalk Empire” addressed the press room. Costar Paz de la Huerta rambled on about the show’s authentic costuming and set design. Everyone else looked pleased but somewhat stunned.

When one reporter asked if there was ever anything proposed, script-wise, that was too edgy even for HBO, Buscemi finally stepped forward and leaned into the mike: “No!” He declared. And then: “Thank you.” And they all filed out....

-- Deborah Vankin

Photo: Steve Buscemi with his wife, Jo Andres, at the SAG Awards.  (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times)

Jesse Eisenberg walks down the carpet with an almost studied seriousness -- as if he has permanently embodied the persona of prickly Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. When he speaks it is quickly but with lots of intensity behind it. Brow furrowed, he picks at the hedge separating him from the press and crunches the green leaves between thumb and forefinger.

He says he didn’t expect all the awards attention the film has garnered.

“When we were making it I thought it was really good, but I’ve thought that about a lot of things that have never been seen. The cultural significance of it couldn’t be planned for.”

When asked if he felt a certain responsibility to the real-life Zuckerberg -- if he worried that the exec was hurt by his portrayal in the film, he paused and said, “I’m in a unique position because my job is to defend my character. If the movie was criticizing the character, which I don’t think it was, from my very subjective point of view I was his champion.”

-- Jessica Gelt  (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times)

For Hilary Swank, who should win the award for most gracious star on the carpet, said that her biggest challenge in playing the role of Betty Anne Waters in ‘Conviction,’ was “doing it justice.”

“Because this is the type of story not to mess up,” she said of the film, which recounts a sister’s heroic attempt to clear her brother’s name of a murder charge. “Betty Anne is such a selfless, graceful person, and had I failed in her eyes I wouldn’t have been able to live with myself. So I’m glad I made her proud.”

-- Jessica Gelt  (Vince Bucci / Associated Press)

Apparently, the cast of “Mad Men” is never at a loss for a way to have a good time. Rich Sommer, who plays the endearingly earnest ad man Harry Crane, says that one of his favorite memories from last season involved getting down to one of the year’s most R-rated songs.

“The other day I heard Cee Lo singing ‘{Forget] You,’ and I was reminded of how I was first introduced to it,” he said, smiling. “Jon Hamm put it on repeat and everyone was dancing to it in our “Mad Men” garb. It was a fun day. I miss work.”

-- Jessica Gelt

Photo: Hamm on the Screen Actors Guild red carpet.  (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times)

Never fear -- the sun finally showed up in time for the Champagne toast on the red carpet at the Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday.

A lot of pomp and circumstance, considering that all Scott Bakula said when he raised his glass was, “To the 17th annual Screen Actors Guild Awards.”

Then he bellowed, “Welcome!”

What sets this year’s event apart? “There are some especially beautiful scripts this year,” Bakula said before the toast, with “The King’s Speech” and “The Social Network” being “two great examples of that.”

-- Deborah Vankin  (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times)

Rico Rodriguez, who plays Manny on “Modern Family,” put Scott Bakula to shame. He’s 12 years old and was working the carpet with ease. “I was here last year,” he said, looking dapper in a gray suit and colorful tie. “I got it down by now. It’s all about staying calm.”

Then Bakula came up and patted him on the shoulder. “He doesn’t know who I am, but I know who he is,” said Bakula.

Rodriguez grinned from ear to ear.

-- Deborah Vankin  (Kevork Djansezian / Getty Images)

The ladies of “Glee” are getting really comfortable with this red-carpet, awards-circuit stuff, and it shows.

Looking polished and confident but still excited by the glitz, Amber Riley (above) and Jenna Ushkowitz both asserted separately that SAG is a particularly special honor for the cast because as Riley put it, “Actors and actresses love our show!”

They know because heavy-hitters tell them so.

“Last year at the SAG awards we met Meryl Streep, says Ushkowitz, giggling. “She was like, ‘Enjoy the ride, you guys are amazing,’ ”

-- Jessica Gelt  (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times)

It’s good to have friends in a Facebook world. Just ask Denise Grayson, who was wide-eyed and maybe a bit bewildered as she was one of the first arrivals to make her way down the carpet. “I feel like Cinderella,” said the Hollywood newcomer, who was a Wall Street lawyer before taking a new path with a supporting role in “The Social Network.” “To get this oppoprnity, to work with people like Aaron Sorkin and David Fincher on a first project, I can’t even put it into words.”

She dismissed the idea that the movie is about technology.

“It’s about creativity and communication on a human level,” she said. “It’s a story that all of us can relate to on a deeper level.”

-- Geoff Boucher  (Frazer Harrison / Getty Images)

Judah Friedlander is sauntering down the red carpet, clearly comfortable after years of “30 Rock” killing it on TV. He’s wearing a black baseball cap with some bling/crystals punctuating the word “expecting.” What, exactly, is he expecting? “To have a party” he says, clearly confident.

The N.Y.-based comic, who performs standup around LA, is also the author of a relatively new book, “How to Beat Up Anybody.” It came out a few months ago and he says he’s especially proud of that.

-- Jessica Gelt

Photo: Judah Friedlander, right, shakes hands with “Glee’s” Harry Shum Jr. at the17th annual Screen Actors Guild Awards.  (Kevork Djansezian / Getty Images)

“Hot in Cleveland’s” Jane Leeves stops on the carpet to exchange air kisses and a light embrace with Mariska Hargitay of “Law & Order: SVU” when a surprise face interrupted the exchange. It was Alec Baldwin with a big smile and hello for Hargitay. “I’m jealous,” Leeves said.

-- Geoff Boucher

Photo: Leeves, center, with her “Hot in Cleveland” costars Valerie Bertinelli, left, and Wendie Malick.  (Kirk McKoy / Los Angeles Times)

Through the crack in the black curtain next to where Melissa Leo was being photographed by People magazine after her win for her role as the troubled, feisty and devoted mother in ‘The Fighter,’ the actress could be heard telling a flustered photographer who was trying to pose her, “It feels like it’s some sort of photo shoot and I’m not really there for you baby.”

Then the photographer tried another tactic, this time more hands off. How did Leo want to pose?

“Whatever you’d like, it’s your set,” she said regaining her composure but still posing with her award directly in front of her face.

-- Jessica Gelt  (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times)

At 94, Ernest Borgnine is still a ham. Together with his wife, Tova, and stars Tim Conway and Morgan Freeman, Borgnine made his way through the maze of post-lifetime-achievement-award press that was awaiting him just outside the backstage exit -- TV crews, roaming reporters, stray photographers. A few minutes later, in the photo pool room, which was electric with the constant pop of multple flashbulbs, he swayed right and left, smiling, thumbs hooked onto the waistline of his pants, inside his jacket. Conway, Freeman and his wife filed out into the lobby. But Borgnine stayed on stage, addressing the throng of photographers, reveling in his moment.

His wife said there was a long evening of festivities planned: They’d head to the SAG after-gala; then continue partying with close friends Doug Briggs (CEO of QVC network) and his wife, who’d flown into L.A. for Borgnine’s award. Of her husband, she said: “Life to him, is always possible. In that way he’s a ham. But a good one.”

Borgnine wasn’t as sure as his wife about the plans to continue partying. He said he just wanted to go home and relax. But one thing he will continue with, he hopes, is his acting. He says he’s nowhere near finished. “Of course I plan to keep going!” he said. Then he nudged his wife: “We need the money, right?”

-- Deborah Vankin

Photo: Ernest Borgnine and wife Tova.  (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times)

There wouldn’t be any partying for SAG winner Clare Danes, who took the prize for her portrayal of animal-husbandry hero Temple Grandin. She said that she was taking the red-eye after the awards in order to shoot a pilot for her new Showtime series, “Homeland.”

“We’ll see how good my work will be tomorrow,” she said.

Soon after that she fielded questions in the press room and managed to be witty despite her fatigue. When asked about acting as a child she said, “My first job was when I was 12 years old. I did a pilot with Dudley Moore that was more ‘dud’ than ‘Dudley,’ but he was great!”

-- Jessica Gelt  (Matt Sayles / Associated Press)

Even though things got off to a somewhat late and discombobulated start, SAG President Ken Howard seems unfazed. In fact, he felt confident that the SAG awards are not only a predictor of sorts to the Oscars, but that they were setting the tone for all awards ceremonies to come.

“They’re the best ones. The SAG awards are a hard act to follow,” he said. “They’re tighter, they’re not as long. And there’s something especially exciting about peer awards.”

-- Deborah Vankin

Photo: Screen Actors Guild President Ken Howard addresses the audience at the 17th annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Shrine Auditorium.  (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)