Pillitteri comedy night raises almost $94,000 for Terry Fox Foundation

Joe Pillitteri’s comedy night is always a good time, with lots of laughs, as expected — but also always comes with a reminder of his reason for doing it, which is his commitment to raising money to cure cancer.

And it certainly did both Friday evening at the community centre.

When it was time for Pillitteri to speak about why he and more than 400 others were at the community centre, he told of an emotional meeting with Megan Dyck and her family.

Megan is a 15-year-old living with an extremely rare kind of cancer, especially for a young girl. With her parents at the show, he talked about the news “nobody wants to hear,”  that her cancer has spread, and which she knows is fatal.

She had been part of a clinical study sponsored by the Terry Fox Foundation, explained Pillitteri, but the treatment didn’t accomplish what was intended.

Her parents weren’t sure Megan, who has suffered from birth with Trisomy 8, a rare genetic condition causing both intellectual and physical disabilities, would understand what that meant. “But she did understand, and immediately wanted to do everything she could to live. And she began dividing up her toys for her friends,” as mementos to remember her.

“She’s afraid to go to sleep now,” said Pillitteri. “She wants to be sure to say her last words to her family. So sad,” he said, having trouble getting the words out. “So sad.”

“All she wants to do is go to Red Roof Retreat (where she takes part in some of the programs and loves to feed the animals), she wants to go to school, and attend as many classes as she can, she wants to see her friends, and enjoy her life.”

And that’s what she continues to do, he said, referring to this year’s Terry Fox T-shirts: “No Matter What” on the front, and on the back, “No matter the distance. No matter the obstacles. No matter the journey. No matter the odds. No matter what.”

That’s what Megan is doing, “still fighting, every single day, no matter what” he said. “I won’t stop, because she won’t stop.”

Thanks to a very generous community of residents and businesses, the evening raised $93,770 for the Terry Fox Foundation as part of Pillitteri’s Team Pillsy contribution to this year’s Terry Fox Run, including ticket sales, the bar, donations of wine from several local wineries and beer from Oast Brewery, and local businesses' donations for raffle gift basket and auction items – every cent made during the evening goes to the foundation.

There was one “extremely generous donation” of $10,000 for a live auction item, said Pillitteri, which included dinner for 20 people at an outdoor location by David Watt and Leigh Atherton of the Garrison House, with a case of League of Farmers red wine, plus four tickets to the Maple Leafs home opener, playing the Pittsburgh Penguins in October.

Peter Ing, president and CEO of the Toronto Maple Leafs Alumni Association was on hand to do his part for the fundraiser, not only with generous auction donations, but onstage, also speaking of Pillitteri’s commitment to the Terry Fox Foundation, and then performing a comedy routine with him — an interview that was a spoof of a Hockey Night in Canada segment, with Pillitteri as the hockey player. Ing playet in the National Hockey League with the Toronto Maple Leafs between 1989 and 1991, and the alumni association donated a Mitch Marner jersey, a Peter Ing jersey, seats for two in an alumni box, plus a signed photo of former Canadian hockey great Daryl Sittler with Terry Fox — items that raised a significant amount toward the total raised at the comedy show.

“Generosity was theme of the night, in every corner of the room,” said Pillitteri.

Comedian Clifford Myers opened the show, admitting he wasn’t following the rules set out by Pillitteri, which involved not offending Joe’s mother Margaret with jokes that were too off-colour. Myers, who was onstage calling out raffle ticket numbers with Joe’s son Johnny and his nephew Vinny Pillitteri Smith, couldn’t stop himself from making jokes referencing teenage sexuality, with half-hearted apologies — and then continued throughout the evening in the same vein.

Pillitteri’s appearance included poking fun at both his parents — Margaret with her still-strong Scottish accent, and Vince, who was injured in a fall, and his morphine-induced comments which fed into the comic’s routine about his father.

Pillitteri thanked the organizational skills of his sisters Eileen Pillitteri Smith and Caroline Martinelli, and good friend Colleen O’Gorman, along with a whole team of friends and family members who help with the successful event — his time on stage telling jokes, he said, is the easy part.