June 30,

2016

Even the presence

of celebrities, high rollers and glamazons in Gucci dresses
cant
compete with a robot cat.
Bill
Murray,
Leslie
Jones (of
the

coming Ghostbusters, out July 15), Cecily Strong and Seth

Rogen and his wife Lauren Miller were all at a Hilarity for
Charity event this week at the Highline Ballroom.
But so were at least two dozen robot cats, otherwise known
as Joy For All companion pets, that had been donated for the
evening by Hasbro, a sponsor.
Wow, theres one on every table, said Ms. Strong, who
didnt think her rescue dog Lucy would appreciate a new
robot cat. Though it would take her a while for her to realize
she was more powerful.
Typically, the Hilarity for Charitywhich Mr. Rogen and Ms.

Miller founded to fight Alzheimers diseaseevents have

been in Los Angeles. But Ms. Millers brother, Dan, a money
manager who lives in Stamford, Conn., thought the reach of
the organization should be expanded to the east coast.
He said, Well do everything and you can just show up,
recalled Ms. Miller. And thats what we did.
Raising money is easy, explained Mr. Miller, who took it
upon himself to arrange for the partys many sponsors,
including Terra Chips and, yes, emotional comfort toys, which
are sometimes used for individuals suffering from dementia.
Theyre really interesting, but Im more of a dog person,
said Mr. Miller, of the robot cats.
Mr. Rogen wasnt sure he wanted one in his house either.
I think it would torture our dog, Zelda, he said, as waiters
served miniature potato latkes around him.
Cecily Strong PHOTO: JIMI CELESTE/PMC

Laverne Cox PHOTO: JIMI CELESTE/PMC

Mr. Rogen and Ms. Miller agreed that putting a charity event
together is difficult, but that being said, it always comes
together, Mr. Rogen noted.

One consistent thing is

while were planning, we
feel like we dont have
anyone to perform, he
continued. And then the
day of the show, we have
too many people.
On Wednesdays docket
were comedians Michael Che, Gary Gulman, Michelle Wolf,
the Dan Band and a mentalist named Oz Pearlman.
We were very curious how the robot cat would react to the
evenings acts, so we brought her upstairs to the press table
on the balcony, opened a bag of Terra chips and waited,
petted and watched.
The cat we tested was silver with white mitts. She seemed to
really enjoy some warm-up music by Maroon 5 and Pharrell
Williams. She shook her head quite a bit during Crazy in
Love by Beyonc. But an opening sketch featuring Mr.
Rogen and an audience member didnt impress her. She
meowed very loudly during the scene and then rolled over,
almost in surrender.
Michael Che PHOTO: JIMI CELESTE/PMC
During Mr. Ches
relatively racy sethe
described the audience
as a very diverse group
of white peoplethe
cat meowed loudly
enough that a woman
sitting behind us asked
that we turn her off. We
brushed the cat a little
more, hoping that might
relax her and she would sit still and be quiet, to no avail.

The woman complained again.

Fine, we said. Well put her on mute.
But that didnt stop the stuffed animal from purring when Ms.
Wolf joked about dying alone from a cat eating her face. And
it went into overdrive when the mentalist brought some folks
up on stage and guessed that one of them had a cat in her
childhood named Flossy who was fluffy, white and
orange.
The robot cat raised a paw in solidarity.
Ms. Jones turned out to be the secret weapon of the evening.
In lieu of an auctioneer, she came out to harass guests to
donate more and more funds, via text message.
Youve got eight buttons on your jacket, youve definitely
got $5,000, Ms. Jones told a gentleman in the audience. She
also offered to show her breasts for $1,000 bucks a pop.
Of course, when it came to actually opening up her wallet
and giving money, the robot cat kept to herself. She stopped
purring or moving and didnt offer a single dollar.