parties

Sports Stars Shine Light on Meaningful Cause at HelpCureHD Gala

Daniel Ortiz
Sports Stars Shine Light on Meaningful Cause at HelpCureHD Gala

Jim and Whitney Crane with Allie LaForce and Joe Smith

FORMER ASTROS PITCHER Joe Smith and his sportscaster wife Allie LaForce hosted a gala at Minute Maid Park's Union Station in an effort to raise funds and awareness of Huntington’s Disease, which took the life of Smith’s mother in 2020.

Smith and LaForce established their nonprofit HelpCureHD, which provides support for those suffering from the progressive brain disease. Huntington’s Disease hereditary, and there’s a 50 percent chance of passing the gene along to offspring. However, going through IVF and screening embryos before implantation is one way to eliminate the risk, and HelpCureHD has committed to help couples cover the cost of that process. A number of babies and children who are HD-free thanks to the nonprofit’s grant program attended the gala, and Smith and LaForce are currently expecting their first HD-free child.

Silent and live auctions included items like a trip to the Four Seasons in Napa and Diamond Club seats for an Astros game. Anticipating yet another stellar season, a popular live-auction package was two tickets to every ’Stros playoff game (including the World Series!). Those prizes, plus a raffle for a 22-carat Asscher-cut tanzanite ring donated by Shaftel Diamonds, contributed to a total till of more than $500,000.

Among those raising a glass for the cause were Whitney and Jim Crane, Adrienne and Jared Crane, Rachel and Jeff Bagwell, sports reporter Julia Morales, and Astros players Ryan Pressly, Kyle Tucker and Tony Kemp.

Amanda Boffine, Julie Chen, Brooke Bentley Gunst

Ryan and Kat Pressly

Jim and Jo Furr

Charisse Mayer, Cynthia Wolf, Shelley Boyar

Jessica Roupe, Rachel Bagwell, Adrienne Crane, Julia Morales

Christian and Megan Pratt with baby Lincoln, and Morgan and Matthew and Gothard with baby Addie Ruth (photo by Rae Tay Photography)

Elizabeth Elder, Michelle Hart

Danny Shaftel, Allie LaForce and Iraida Brown

Jeff and Rachel Bagwell

Dana Barton, Robert Clay

Sherri Levin, Craig Rapp

Jessica and Matt Morrison

From Your Site Articles
Related Articles Around the Web
Parties
coolest people

Couples and Spa Aficionados Are Seeking Out This Equestrian and NFL Wife’s New Hotspot

LeBrina Jackson (photo by Shamir Johnson)

LEBRINA JACKSON, A noted equestrian with a fascinating story of overcoming challenges to succeed and grow, has always been an entrepreneur with a nurturing spirit. Even as a child growing up in Fifth Ward, she sold homemade popsicles — with fruit juice frozen into Styrofoam cups — for fifty cents, to cool her customers down on hot summer days.

Keep Reading Show less
People + Places
art

This Weekend: HGO Takes on Rarely Staged — and Oft Controversial — Wagner Opera

(photo by Robert Kusel)

Parsifal

TO BE BLUNT, there’s opera, and then there’s Wagner. By the time Richard Wagner had completed Parsifal in 1882, he was using the word bühnenweihfestspiel (“festival play for the consecration of a stage”) instead of “opera” to describe this four-and-a-half-hour epic, where music, drama, lighting, architecture, and quasi-religious ritual come together to create what the Germans called “gesamtkunstwerk,” or a total work of art. In the past decade, only two U.S. opera houses have had the guts to take on Parsifal, which makes the upcoming Houston Grand Opera production even more of a must-see, given how rarely this complex and controversial opera is staged.

Keep Reading Show less
Art + Entertainment