Look Out So Proud June always provides a surfeit of opportunities for prideful activities. Here are but a few glimpses of our annual festival season: by Tim Brookover

Carlo Deason broke the tape at the June 8 Pride 5K Fun Run/Walk, followed by overall female winner Caroline Burum. Richard Peoples and Vicki Danielson led in the masters division. The Houston Montrose Athletic Association race, benefiting AssistHers, attracted 176 jocks pounding the Memorial Drive pavement.

A Sheila Jackson Lee-signed proclamation highlighted the Houston Black, Lesbian, Gay, Transgender Coalition kickoff reception on June 19. Coalition organizer Steven Jerome welcomed a lively Juneteenth crowd at the Houston Lesbian & Gay Community Center, where the coalition has opened an office. Spotted in the crowd: Judge Mattocks, Paul Guillory, Anita Hall, Kevin Jackson, Lori Moore, Buhl Perkins, Dionne Redmond, and Chris Turner.

Houston Buyers Club benefited from Poetry Jam, a June 23 reading at Theatre New West. In addition to reading their own work, Mike Bolin and Joe Watts conceived the spare, dramatic staging for the evening, which also featured Thomas Blanton, Sarah Crowder Holtzmann, and Michael Locke.

Michael Brown, Joe Hlavac, Martin Mercader, Coy Tow, Bart Truxillo, and Lee Williams were six of the silent-auction browsers at the Community Center Art Festival on June 22. Seventeen artists contributed work to the Houston Lesbian & Gay Community Center benefit, including Roberto Guzman, who motored in from Laredo with his photograph. Other artists represented: David Aylsworth, Thomas Chelena, Jamey Davenport, Kermit Eisenhut (who created a painting for the event), Teodoro Estrada, Richard Fluhr, Jean-Claude Gilles, David Groover, Tori McMillen, Patrick Palmer, Jose Solis III, Vera Taylor, David J. Webb, Richard Williams, and Kat Zemanek.

On June 25, civil rights warriors Phyllis Frye and Ray Hill amazed and entertained the audience at “Houston’s First Decade: 1975-1985,” presented by Stonewall Law Association of Greater Houston. Aaron Coleman read “Montrose,” his homage to the neighborhood. New Stonewall prexy Jerry Simoneaux and his partner Chris Bown organized the June 25 event at the Texas Southern University Thurgood Marshall School of Law. The audience included Troy Christensen, Judge Steven Kirkland, Eugene Harrington (in whose name the lawyers dedicated an academic-excellence award at TSU), and Brenda Silva. Donations benefited Community Awareness for Transgender Support, Q-Patrol, Stonewall Lawyers, and the Gulf Coast Archive and Museum of GLBT History.

Paul Hager directed the June 26 performance of the comedy Comfort & Joy that supported the Gulf Coast Archive and Museum and the Pride Committee of Houston. Among those chortling in the Theatre Suburbia audience: Don Gill, Jewel Gray, Bill O’Rourke, GCAM prexy Bruce Reeves, and Brandon Wolf. Judy Reeves, GCAM secretary as well as Theatre Suburbia stalwart, pulled double duty: assistant director and the offstage voice of Marci, a frazzled Hollywood secretary.

Hal Core, Richard Elbein, Rabbi Steven Gross, Cantor Marilyn Ladin, Madeleine Manning, Victor Schill, and Mark Unbehagen planned the Interfaith Pride Worship Service that took place on June 26 at Congregation Beth Israel. Rabbi David Whiman of Beth Israel and the Rev. Gwen Pierre of Wheeler Avenue Baptist Church (subbing for a hospitalized Rev. William Lawson) presided.

On June 27, health educators deployed across the city for National HIV Testing Day. Jeff Benavides led the troops at Thomas Street Clinic, one of the sites.

Paul Arcizo and Linda Morales presided over the return of Baile Internacional, the black-tie dance. On June 28, a crowd of 500 rocked Ripley House and included Mark Amaro, Monsour and Soraida Akbar, Raquel Cedillo, Mela Contreras, Diana Escamilla, Terry Flores, Lily Hernandez, and Luis Miranda. The event raised funds for the Pride Committee and Resurrection Metropolitan Community Church.

Of the remarkable company that performed in Before the Parade Passes By, the June 28 cabaret show, ballerina-turned-chanteuse Lauren Anderson and Omari Tau Williams provided just two of the show-stopping moments. Taking the stage in a marabou-trimmed minidress that showcased her sensational gams, Anderson delighted the capacity crowd at the Alley Theatre with a languid, soulful spin of “Everything,” the lovely Paul Williams/Rupert Holmes tune. Late in the Ken Williamson-directed Pride Committee benefit, Williams took his star turn in a gospel-charged rendition of the “Beauty School Dropout” number from Grease. Whooping and whirling across the stage like the love child of Patti Labelle and Ben Vereen, Williams proved that the combo of talent and old-fashioned star quality can still stun. Indeed, everyone in the cast—a pleasing assemblage of varying ages, shapes, and shades—made the evening a smash. And who was that adorable drummer?