No details of the wedding itself have leaked, yet, nor have we seen the bride. But we have seen the father of the bride, twice, and the mother of the bride once. They gave a two-second wave to the cameras last night as they alighted from their van for an after-dinner party at the stately Beekman Arms, where many of the wedding guests are staying.

Former President Clinton, wearing a suit jacket and gray pants, had definitely lost weight, per Chelsea’s instructions. By cutting out junk food and exercising more, we were told, he actually lost more than 20 pounds, going five pounds further than his daughter had ordered.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton wore a flowing, floor-length green print dress, her hair was brightly blond and she was grinning broadly.

Mr. Clinton made his first foray into town earlier Friday, having lunch at Gigi Trattoria, a local eatery, where he skipped dessert. Curiosity and celeb fever had built to such a fever pitch here, where hundreds of news media and pseudo-media have been encamped for a week, that Laura Pensiero, who owns Gigi Trattoria, said Mr. Clinton may have made the appearance simply “to let some steam out of the kettle.”

We don’t expect to see the Clintons today, but the crowd is already gathering at the main intersection here in this subdued, old-money town along the Hudson about two hours north of New York City. Tonight, the sky is expected to be set aglow by fireworks after Chelsea and Marc Mezvinsky, who works for a hedge fund, say their “I dos.”

The prospect of seeing the Clintons and any other celebrities has gripped residents, who uniformly describe “Chelsea’s weekend” as a “royal” event. Up to 500 people are expected to attend, and many of them wandered out of the Beekman last night in their evening finery to get a drink at Gigi Trattoria.

“I’m star-struck!” said Melodie Molinare, 50, the postmaster of Rhinebeck, as she stood on the packed street corner, held back by wooden police barricades. “I want to see them. I don’t have to touch them. I want to see Chelsea in her dress.”

Among those spotted going into the Beekman Friday included Madeleine Albright, the former secretary of state, with Vernon Jordan, the well-known Democratic power broker. (Mr. Jordan is not a well-recognized figure up here, and one man in the crowd across the street identified him as Hamilton Jordan, the late top aide to Jimmy Carter. Another identified him as Warren Buffett.)

One man in the crowd confidently identified another guest as Steve Madden, the shoe designer, who quickly raced inside the inn from a van. We have not been able to confirm that. 

He also identified another guest as Kobe Bryant, but we were told Mr. Bryant is not attending.

The vast majority of guests looked to be in their late 20s or 30s, perhaps college and work friends of the bride and groom. Perhaps they will be celebrities some day, but for now they can rest comfortably in their anonymity. They seemed to be a mixture of Arkansas and the hedge fund world. One blonde in a ballooning yellow dress walked across the street to the gawkfest and took pictures of the locals, then had her picture taken with them, then posed with a bemused and very patient state trooper.

“We don’t know who we’re looking at,” one bystander complained. “My God, they all look like they’re in their 20s. They’re kids! Seriously, I want to see Oprah.”

Onlookers clearly had varied definitions of celebrity. While one local was excited about spotting Terry McAuliffe, the celebrity spotting was less exciting for Rachel Squillante who lives in Manhattan but returned home to Rhinebeck for the weekend to catch a glimpse of some stars. Ms. Squillante, 24, and a friend had heard that Jennifer Lopez was in town. But the only big name guest they saw was Ms. Albright whom Ms. Squillante’s friend didn’t know.

Oprah Winfrey, Barbra Streisand, John Major and Steven Spielberg are said to not be coming. Still, several locals insisted that Ms. Winfrey had been spotted at the Holy Cow, a nearby ice cream shop, on Friday.

The anticipation in the crowd last night reached such a frenzy that when state troopers lined up between the gawkers and the guests, a woman from an Italian television station yelled to one of the troopers to move. “We can’t see!” she said. He smiled.

Arlene Newman drove with two friends from Castleton, a small town near Albany, to get a glimpse of the former president and the bride. After eating dinner, they waited more than two hours across from the Beekman Arms hoping to spot them.

“We heard Bill was here today,” Ms. Newman said. “We love him. My mom is in a nursing home. She loves him. We wish them well. It’s royalty. It’s our royalty.” She added that until now Ms. Clinton had succeeded in keeping her life private. “They left her alone,” she said. “They didn’t hound her like Princess Diana.”
As Ms. Newman’s friends chatted about how beautiful Chelsea Clinton had become since her youth and reminisced how she led her parents across the White House lawn following the Monica Lewinsky scandal, Ms. Newman agreed. “Aye, yi, yi. I hope she has lots of babies.”

Earlier in the evening, a handful of local business owners raised some sparkling wine at the Blue Cashew Kitchen supply to toast the vows of Marc and Chelsea. Ms. Pensiero said that at lunch yesterday, Mr. Clinton arrived at her restaurant with his half-brother, Roger, and a half-dozen guests whom she believed were friends and relatives. She said the former president greeted guests, shook hands with the kitchen’s workers and filled the restaurant with so much “electricity in the air” that “nobody had much of an appetite.” She said that she thanked Mr. Clinton for having lunch there and “he thanked me for putting up with the chaos.” Ms. Pensiero’s catering business had already been busy all week delivering roughly 200 meals a day to different businesses working on wedding preparations.

Other businesses already had benefited from the boost in business. Maureen Missner, whose shop Paper Trail is believed to be helping to prepare the gift bags, talked about how different the feel of this wedding was compared to last year when the actor Griffin Dunne held his wedding in the area and local residents spotted celebrities like Hugh Jackman.

She said that comparing it to Mr. Dunne’s wedding put these festivities into perspective. “This is not a star-studded wedding,” said Ms. Missner. “This is clearly about the bride and groom.”