THE CROWD:

“Cathy has lived most everywhere, from Zanzibar to Barkley Square, but Patty has only seen the sights a girl can see from Brooklyn Heights. What a crazy pair.”

As I sat across the table from Patty Duke, the melody and the words from her television show theme ran through my head. It was almost like being obsessed by the camp song “100 Bottles of Beer on the Wall.” You know the one, that melody that gets in your brain while riding in the back of the bus going to summer camp. I stared across the table at the diminutive woman with a very short haircut, wearing enormous glasses that covered most of her upper face and a big laugh that was at first startling and then contagious. I tried to envision the teenage girl who once was the most popular young lady in America.

Patty Duke, whose career in show business began on the very highest plateau, has lived a life of remarkable highs and equally remarkable lows. She won an Oscar at 16 for her role in the movie “The Miracle Worker,” reprising a part she began on Broadway at an even younger age.

She came to Newport last week from her current home in Idaho with husband Mike Pierce to address the Silver Ribbon Dinner benefiting the Brain Imaging Center at UCI. Diagnosed as what was then called manic-depressive, Duke says she was on the verge of suicide.

“I didn’t want to hurt my children. I didn’t want to hurt my husband. I just wanted to end the pain,” she shared with an audience of more than 300 at the Island Hotel in Newport Beach.

Duke, 61, went on to reveal that at 35 she spent months in her bed, barely able to get up to go to the restroom. Her illness is now known as bipolar disorder.

“I walk in the shadow of someone who benefited from the earlier experience of psychiatry,” said Duke, adding, “Undiagnosed and untreated mental illness stinks.”

The audience let out a collective gasp as the actress shared her most personal feelings. “I have a fair shot now. The statistics state that there are only one in three people who suffer from bipolar disorder who are able to turn their life around.”

The 11th annual Silver Ribbon Dinner was chaired by Peggy Goldwater Clay and Lana Chandler. KOCE TV’s Maria Hall Brown served as the eloquent mistress of ceremonies, keeping the evening flowing with the appropriate amount of seriousness, given the subject matter. UCI scientist and physician Steven Potkin, director of the Brain Imaging Center, updated the audience on the state of clinical research with relation to the UC Irvine Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior.

Honored at the dinner was Brain Imaging Center volunteer Sharon Pfister, who has devoted her adult life to working with people in need of assistance in the community. Pfister began as a volunteer for the Girl Scouts, then became active in her parish church. She followed that with work for the Red Cross blood bank, local food distribution charities and, 10 years ago, became involved with the center.

Her passion has been to help, in particular, adult schizophrenic children. Pfister commented, “It has been a blessing and a privilege to witness the scientific breakthroughs that have come through research at UCI, that are making a difference in the treatment and care of individuals suffering from mental disorders.”

Also on hand for the ceremony was UCI Chancellor Michael Drake and his wife, Brenda. Drake delivered a very special welcome and introduction to the evening and to Duke. The evening was generously sponsored and underwritten by ACRA Aerospace, Inc. represented by Stan Hanson and Eve Kornyei.

Also sponsoring the evening were Sandra Brodie, the Keith Family Foundation, Harriett and Sandy Sandhu, Peggie and Robert Sprague, Eric and Lila Nelson, Michael and Mary Reafsnyder, Jim Warsaw, Judi Jacobs, Linda and Ross Peters, and Lawrence and Leslie Cancellieri, to name only a few.

“No more crazy highs, and no more suicidal lows; I have my life back,” said Duke. They call her Anna Marie now, her given name. “Patty,” she says, is the person that used to be.

Crediting her second husband, Mike, of 22 years, with part of her successful turnaround, Duke was given a standing ovation by the crowd genuinely touched by her candor.

Many in the Island Hotel ballroom stood as I did trying to imagine a very different world more than 40 years ago as the lyrics to the theme song of the Patty Duke Show continued to circulate in my brain. So much has changed.

The evening raised $65,000 to benefit UCI research. Distinguished guests, also in the crowd, included Jean Liechty, Blynn and William Bunney, Erin Fitzgerald, Joseph Wu, Derek Taylor, Aram and Margie Keith, Barbara and Kyle Eidsen, Marica Pendjar, Nahid Khonsari, the lovely Patricia Giddings, and Tom Birch and his fiancee, Lea Tedrow.

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