Certainly, Hollywood is charmed. “Amazing movie,” a ballcap-clad DiCaprio told Bong at his party, shaking the director’s hand. The next morning, at a buffet brunch thrown for the upcoming Independent Spirit Awards, Bong was so mobbed by well-wishers and selfie-seekers that the simple act of moving from one side of the room to the other became an arduous task.

“I love meeting fellow artists and filmmakers, but parties like this are quite strange,” Bong said, musing about how different an event like this would be in South Korea: “There, we all sit down, but here, we’re always standing!" He gave me a sheepish grin. “Sometimes, my legs hurt.”

He has relocated to the United States for all of January to attend award shows and continue promoting “Parasite,” and on Saturday, he had a full slate of parties and panels ahead of him. One such event was the afternoon tea party thrown by Bafta, the London-based academy, which drew not just Bong and DiCaprio but also a strong contingent of British talent including Sacha Baron Cohen, the “Midsommar” and “Little Women” breakout Florence Pugh, and the “1917” leads George MacKay and Dean-Charles Chapman.

Even in a room so packed with celebrities, there was still one corner of the Bafta party bisected by a velvet rope, and behind it sat Elton John and his husband, David Furnish, who produced “Rocketman,” the Globe-nominated musical based on John’s life. As the movie’s star, Taron Egerton, posed for pictures nearby, an impressed John said, “He became a man on this film.”

I asked John if he ever wondered how “Rocketman” would have turned out if it had starred Tom Hardy, who was attached to the project several years ago. “It wouldn’t have been right. Things happen for a reason,” John said. “And he couldn’t sing!”