On Saturday, January 30, 2010 Barbara Eden and a bunch of celebrities gathered at the Beverly Hills Home of Renee Taylor and Joe Bologna who hosted a luncheon and auction to benefit the remaining residents at the Motion Picture Home. Barbara Eden donated am autographed Jeannie bottle raising $1,600 for the cause.

This article appeared in the Los Angeles Daily News:

Celebrities pitch in to help cash-strapped Motion Picture Home
By Kevin Modesti, Staff Writer

BEVERLY HILLS - Movie and TV stars responded to a call for action Saturday, not on a set but at a charity auction to raise money for residents of the financially troubled Motion Picture & Television Fund nursing home in Woodland Hills.

The event billed as an "emergency fundraiser" drew about 200 celebrities and Hollywood memorabilia-seekers to the tree-shrouded backyard of actors Joseph Bologna and Renee Taylor.

They hoped to raise $100,000 in the auction, which began with a painting by Phyllis Diller selling for $500 and a genie bottle signed by Barbara Eden going for $1,600.

David Streets auctions off the "I Dream of Jeanie" bottle
signed by Barbara Eden.
(John McCoy/Staff Photographer)

"This is about trying to save the 60 or so people who are in the Motion Picture Home," said actress Shirley Jones, who attended the auction with her husband, comedian Marty Ingels. "I thought it was always going to be there."

Actor Elliott Gould said the fundraiser was a case of "our taking care of our own" and an attempt to prompt public awareness.

The Motion Picture & Television Fund announced last January that it faced annual operating losses of $10 million and would close the acute-care hospital and long-term-care unit that have served stars and behind-the-scenes workers for decades. Fund operators said other parts of the 40-acre campus on Mulholland Drive would remain open, including cottage residences, assisted-living facilities and other health and recreational services.

The fund, saying it is responding to "false accusations and rumors," states on its Web site that long-term-care residents "are NOT being abandoned" and that the residents are being helped to transfer to other facilities.

Taylor said she and Bologna visited residents on Christmas Day to sing carols at what is referred to colloquially as the Motion Picture Home, and became aware of their need for services and supplies. Taylor said the couple decided to try to help, hoping to stay out of the politics of the facility's operation and raise money that could be given directly to residents.

"I think we should raise $100 million and just keep this place open. That's my amateur opinion," Taylor said in warming up the crowd for the auction. Taylor, the actress, writer and director who played Fran Drescher's mother in "The Nanny," said she and her husband were motivated to help "because someday we may be one of those people (at the facility).

"Many of us understand the economic strain," Gould said, "but what we cannot understand and will not stand for is that people who are there (at the home) are being dispossessed. The people who are there should stay there."

A publicist said items scheduled for auction included a painting by Barbra Streisand, two of Frank Sinatra's neckties donated by his daughter Nancy, a signed Andy Warhol lithograph of Jane Fonda, and memorabilia from Steve Allen, Jayne Russell, Shirley MacLaine and Esther Williams.