Talk on the red carpet at Glamour magazine's annual Women of the Year awards Monday night at Carnegie Hall turned to the country's man of the year, Barack Obama. "Change is among us," said singer Fergie, who was scheduled to perform during the ceremony. "People are definitely in a better mood this week."

After the election, "I wrote everybody I knew and I just said, 'I'm just grateful that we're alive to see this happen,' " said Ralph Lauren-clad Debra Messing, a former Glamour honoree back to present Jane Goodall with a lifetime achievement award.

Coming so close on the heels of the election, the ceremony's typically motley mix of politicians and entertainers felt particularly pronounced. Fergie, wearing white and silver Michael Kors, gushed that she wanted to meet honoree Hillary Clinton: "I'm putting that out there."

Honoree Tyra Banks, sporting sleek black Gucci, said she was nervous about the company she was keeping. "I heard they don't have a teleprompter, so I'm like, 'OK, I'm going to just have to go off the cuff in front of Hillary Clinton and (fellow honoree) Condoleezza Rice.' "

Banks shouldn't have feared. Rice revealed that though she hasn't exactly had the time to take in America's Next Top Model over the past eight years, she was excited to meet the model turned media mogul.

Nicole Kidman, in town to promote her new film, Australia, paraded a L'Wren Scott cream sheath down the red carpet. Of her Women of the Year award, she said: "It's such a privilege. I feel a little overwhelmed."

Rice, resplendent in a chocolate and gold Oscar de la Renta gown, had kind words about her fellow A-list political honoree, Clinton: "I'm very fond of her, and I think she's a great lady."

Rice, who's looking forward to her own kind of change come Jan. 20 - heading back to Stanford, writing a book or two - said of another A-list political woman, Michelle Obama: "She looks wonderful in everything she wears." Her fashion advice to the future first lady? "It's OK to wear red once in a while."