Cynthia Nixon not donating $50,000 last night.Photo: Getty Images
Cynthia Nixon showed up at last night’s GLAAD Media Awards as an out-and-proud lesbian — a big step, given her involuntary outing by gossip columns a few years back — but her showy $50,000 donation to the LGBT cause, announced by GLAAD president Neil Giuliano in front of a capacity crowd at the Marriot Marquis, came as an even bigger surprise. Particularly, as it turns out, to Nixon herself. “I don’t know if it was a joke or a case of mistaken identity,” she said when we bumped into her later. “I donated $1,000.” (This morning we were greeted with a voice message from a GLAAD flack setting the record straight, as it were.)
But the night was filled with all sorts of misunderstandings. Kate Clinton joked about turning 60 and receiving GLAAD’s Pioneer award, “which sounds so old,” she said. “But that’s all right. One time someone was trying to introduce me as a Stonewall lesbian and they actually introduced me as a Stonehenge lesbian.” Rosie O’Donnell, awarded for the HBO documentary All Aboard! Rosie’s Family Cruise, publicly apologized to Tom Ford, “because I mistook him this evening for that guy from the Blow Out show on Bravo.” And, finally, Whoopi Goldberg, the night’s opening speaker, quieted thunderous applause by telling the crowd, “All right, dammit, all right. I’m coming out. Sit down.” No one was sure if it was a joke. —Jada Yuan
