Equality California Awards: Honoring Dear Abby and Starring Lorna Luft

Saturday evening we attended the 2008 Equality Awards Gala event in Palm Springs, honoring Advice columnist Dear Abby, and Tim Hanlon, of Wells Fargo Bank Foundation. More on the awards event in a few moments. You may recall my post last year when Patti Lupone was the 2007 award honoree. A FEW EDITORIAL COMMENTS: Regular readers know that I usually avoid political subjects on this blog. This site is intended to be light entertainment for all readers. I respect that everyone is in their own place with personal views and opinions, so I never "lecture" readers who take the time to visit. For those of you interested, EQCA is an organization whose mission is to achieve equality in California for gay and lesbian people. It does not seek special rights but rather, to extend the same rights that straight people already have and also reduce discrimination. Since is an this election year, EQCA has focused its efforts to defeat "California Proposition 8" which seeks to overturn the existing law that allows same sex couples to marry in California. Basically EQCA is trying to preserve an existing right in our state. Since I lean toward the more conservative side of the spectrum, I'm not an activist type by nature, and sometimes I get a little uncomfortable with fringe views within some special interest groups. However, on this issue EQCA seeks to initiate dialogue between everyday people, to share their own experiences about the topic of same sex marriage. During her remarks later in the evening "Dear Abby" said: "I believe if two people want to commit to each other, God bless 'em. That is the highest form of commitment, for heaven's sake, and what's wrong with a little more love and positive energy in this world?" Never one to shy away from expressing her opinion, I think Dear Abby has hit it right on the head.

"Dear Abby" with The Palm Springs Savant, Rick Rockhill:

Left: I found Dear Abby to be gracious, charming and very sweet. I enjoyed the opportunity to speak with her. The Equality Awards Gala is one of the early events of the Palm Springs social season. It is formal-wear event, although slightly more casual than some of the full black tie events. The evening began with cocktail hour and a silent auction. The auction featured a nice selection of vacation packages, certificates to restaurants and spas and art by local area artists, all fully donated. The costs of the evening were underwritten by sponsors, to allow revenue from the silent auction and ticket sales to benefit EQCA. When we reached our table in the ballroom, there were signs on the table that said "in lieu of floral centerpieces, we have used those donated funds to support the campaign to defeat Proposition 8", which seemed like a good idea.

above: a wonderful smooth-jazz band provided entertainment during dinner

above left: the tables were set with rose petals scattered on the black table linens. above right: a thin cucumber peel held the chopped salad nicely. The entree was beef tenderloin, I was so hungry I forgot to snap a photo!

above: they had two desserts, a strawberry or chocolate mousse on a round cake. The chocolate was better than the strawberry, which was a little too sweet for me.

above: Emmy Award winning actor/comedian/playwright Leslie Jordan was the emcee for the evening. He is probably best known for his sharp tongued character as "Beverly Leslie" on TV's Will and Grace. His career includes a number of terrific TV roles in "Boston Legal”, “Hidden Palms” and “Reba", along with movies such as "Sordid Lives". Jordan's quick wit had the audience laughing and kept the program moving along. He is very personable and easy to speak with; we chatted about his act and one of the jokes he told on stage. He enjoys Palm Springs and spends a great deal of time here in the desert.

above: The other honoree for the evening was Palm Springs resident Tim Hanlon, President of the Wells Fargo Bank Foundation. Mr Hanlon is a philanthropist in the Palm Springs community and has dedicated his personal life and career with Wells Fargo to improve the lives of all Californians. He was honored for a long history of community support, but also for questioning inequality in corporate policies and affecting change in the workplace. Wells Fargo is rated with a perfect score by the Human Rights Campaign (HRC); Mr Hanlon had a role in shaping some of the polices adopted by Wells Fargo.
Fabulous Entertainment

above: Actress and performer Lorna Luft was the headline entertainment for the evening. Miss Luft is the daughter of legendary entertainer Judy Garland and producer Sid Luft (mega superstar Liza Minelli is her half sister). She is a successful recording artist, Emmy-nominated producer and best-selling author. Her recent CD "Lorna Luft: Songs My Mother Taught Me", produced by fellow Palm Springs resident Barry Manilow (who is practically my neighbor) celebrates the music of Judy Garland. Lorna recently moved to the Palm Springs area so we'll be seeing more of her around town I am sure!

Dancing the Night Away

above: Following Lorna Luft's performance, the dance floor opened up with the music of a popular DJ who had the well-heeled crowd dancing. It was a fun evening and a great way to support EQCA.

-Rick Rockhill

Equality California Awards Gala: Starring Patti Lupone

On Saturday I attended the annual Equality Awards Gala at the Palm Springs Convention Center. Equality California (EQCA) is an organization that strives to create equality in our state. I'll explain more about what EQCA does later, but first let me tell you about the terrific evening! This was the first major event of "the season" here in the desert. Between October and May, there are over 250 charitable gala events in the Palm Springs area. It's a very active social community, with plenty of wealthy residents who can support their favorite charities and enjoy a formal evening socializing with friends. But I digress. This year's Equality Awards honored Broadway legend Patti Lupone and also the local Greenberg-Peet family who work tirelessly for a wide range of issues and causes in the Palm Springs community and beyond.

The event was "black tie optional, which yielded a nice combination of formal wear, from gentlemen in tuxedos to suits, and ladies with full gowns to cocktail dresses. (I always enjoy going somewhere where everyone is well dressed). I decided to wear my tuxedo with a red ascot instead of a bow tie. I have a collection of ascots (cravats for any Brit readers) that I am single-handily trying to bring back in fashion. The pre-dinner cocktail hour was actually two hours, allowing plenty of time to peruse the items in the silent auction. I resisted the urge to bid on anything, with all of the events I attend each season, my house would be full of all kinds of stuff if I bid at every event!
Time for Dinner...
Inside the ballroom, tables were dressed in black tablecloths and red napkins with boxes of neatly-trimmed beautiful red roses in the center of each table. I was the guest of Integrated Wealth Management (my financial planning advisor), who was a Governor's Circle Sponsor of the evening. The table was right up in front of the center stage, which afforded a fantastic view of the evening's awards presentations and entertainment.

Brodway Legend Patti Lupone Performs
After the required speeches, accolades and presentations were finished, Broadway star and legend Patti Lupone performed as the evening's entertainment. She was very personable, down-to-Earth and came across as genuine and warm. Unfortunately photography was strictly forbidden, so I was unable to capture any images of her performing. She did a narrative of her early career, with songs she performed as a "kid" trying to break into show business. She performed a wide range of Broadway showtunes, in some cases singing the part of the male lead instead of the part she actually played on stage. One very amusing number was from West Side Story, where she sang both roles of Maria and her mother. She switched back and forth, changing her voice and pitch to correspond to each part. It was actually very well done. She also sang "Ya Got Trouble", from Music Man, which is a tough number to perform with its speed and pace. But my favorite part was her closing performance from Evita: "Don't Cry For Me Argentina", a role she famously performed on Broadway. Patti Lupone's incredible talent was evident throughout her nearly 90 minute performance. It was a fantastic evening, one which I will not soon forget.
A note about Equality California (EQCA):
I respect that everyone is in their own place with personal views and opinions, so I will briefly share some information about what EQCA does. EQCA is an organization whose mission is to achieve equality in California for gay and lesbian people. In particular, the core interest is access to marriage. The point of the organization is not to ask for special rights for gays and lesbians, but rather, to extend the same access to marriage that straight people have. During the event last night, they showed a new commercial before dinner showing a woman in her bridal gown, whose father was about to bring her to the ceremony where her fiance was waiting. They showed her being confronted with a wide range of obstacles preventing her from getting married. The obstacles they showed were a metaphor, such as losing her veil, being held back from walking down the aisle, having to step over trash, tripping and falling, etc, all this while her family and husband-to-be watched. The end of the commercial asks "What if you couldn't marry the person you love?" It was a clever approach to the gay marriage debate. The commercial didn't even show any same sex couples, or mention of "rights" or "equality". Instead, it was about family, love, and feelings. I thought it was a good way to shift the debate. I'm honestly not an activist type by nature, but the approach of EQCA these days is to get people to just talk about it, share their own experiences and initiate dialogue between average, everyday people. So that's it. I'm not going to get all political here, that's not what my blog is about. However in my own way I have shared what I learned from last night's event. So whether you agree with the topic or not, watch for this commercial and see how (or if) affects you in anyway. Click here to watch the new commercial if the You Tube window does not appear below

-Rick Rockhill