Love Heals 20 year Anniversary Gala, the Alison Gertz Foundation for AIDS Education

Last week, I attended my first Love Heals event where Founders Dini Von Mueffling, Stefani Greenfield and Victoria Leacock Hoffman celebrated at the 20th Anniversary Gala.  The event took place at the Four Seasons Restaurant in New York City and raised over $675,000.

Julianna Margulies, Cristina Greeven Cuomo and Michael Lorber were honored and the event was emceed by InStyle editor Hal Rubenstein.  Other guests included The Good Wife actors Josh Charles, Alan Cumming and Christine Baranski; Emily Mortimer, Michael J Fox & Tracy Pollan, Donny Deutsch, Chris Cuomo, Patricia Duff, Adam Lippes among other notable New Yorkers.

Julianna Margulies made a heartfelt speech and was moved to tears as she praised Love Heals co-founders, Dini von Mueffling, Stefani Greenfield and Victoria Leacock Hoffman, for following through on their pledge to their best friend Alison Gertz for continuing her AIDS education work.

Actress Emily Mortimer took the stage to introduce and present Cristina Greeven Cuomo’s award and emcee Hal Rubenstein entertained guests throughout dinner. Rubenstein presided over an exciting auction that included the opportunity to win a ‘walk-on’ role on the Emmy award winning television show, The Good Wife. When Julianna Margulies suddenly arose from her seat and offered to share her dressing room with the lucky winner, the bidders went wild, netting $10,000 for the prize.

Broadway stars Daphne Rubin-Vega and Anthony Rapp from the original cast of Rent made certain that there was not a dry eye in the room as they reunited to perform the evening’s finale, an emotional rendition of “Seasons of Love”.

Love Heals, The Alison Gertz Foundation for AIDS Education  was founded in 1992, following AIDs activist Alison Gertz’s untimely death. She contracted HIV from a single sexual encounter at the age of 16.  Over the past 20 years, Love Heals partnered with more than 700 schools and community groups and by the close of 2011, Love Heals will have directly educated more than 500,000 young people about the realities of HIV and AIDS.