Celebrity News

St. Jude Research Hospital black-tie gala canceled at last minute

The plug has been pulled on a glamorous Upper East Side black-tie gala Thursday, with hosts who were to include Richard Gere, Danny Aiello and socialite singer Consuelo Vanderbilt Costin.

Sources said the St. Jude Winter Ball was scheduled to go down at the Fletcher-Sinclair Mansion at the Ukrainian Institute of America.

But it was canceled when organizers of the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital benefit got into a dispute with a firm repping sponsors including Uber, Reebok Sports Club and the Jets. (Sources said the hubbub was because the charity wanted to only give sponsors the needed paperwork to write off donations six months after the event.)

On the gala’s honorary committee were Jennifer Love Hewitt, Alyssa Milano and Billy Bob Thornton.

Gere and Aiello even voiced an animated short for the gala, and items to be auctioned off included a portrait of Martin Luther King and a 1977 photo of Mick Jagger at Studio 54.

A rep for Memphis-based St. Jude said the event was “volunteer run” and the hospital was not directly involved with it.