Porchlight Music Theater’s Icons Gala fundraising event included silent and live auctions and a tribute to director and choreographer Jerome Robbins.

While the tribute included some dancing, I doubt that it was original Robbins choreography. There was much more singing, with performances from Robbins shows such as Gypsy, On The Town, The Pajama Game, Bells Are Ringing, West Side Story, Fiddler on the Roof, and A Funny Thing Happened On the Way to the Forum.

The inclusion of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum at an event featuring an auction was particularly appropriate. The first recorded auctions were in Greece around 500 B.C., though oddly, the word auction derives from the Latin word that translates as an increase.

The main items sold at early Greek auctions were daughters, sold to be brides. Courtesans also were sold, as in A Funny Thing Happened, which was set around 200 B.C., although, fortunately for me, Porchlight produced a 2015 version that I was around to attend, as I was unavailable in 200 B.C.

Porchlight offered a variety of items for purchase at the gala, 59 in the silent auction, and 6 in the live auction, but, fortunately, unlike ancient Greece, none of them involved the transfer of people, although there were a few that involved people agreeing to subjugate themselves by preparing dinner for the winning bidders. In the hope that someone, anyone really, would prepare a dinner for me, I bid vigorously on one such item, but, alas, came up short.

Bill Kurtis and Donna La Pietra served as emcees for the introductions of the live auction items, or rather she did as he stood by her side looking legendary, before they turned things over to a real auctioneer, who put on a show of his own, compete with flashing lights, but no courtesans.