Pride Houston Parade and Festival

Comments (0) By Troy Schulze Thursday, Jun 23 2011

For some humbugs, today is simply the day to avoid another annual shutdown of the intersection at Montrose and Westheimer. But for about 200,000 people every year, it’s the most fabulous street closing in the city. For more than 30 years, Pride Houston has organized the annual festival and parade celebrating Houston’s GLBT community. According to Pride Houston’s Web site, the celebration is attended by 150,000 people every year from all over the world. It commemorates the 1969 Stonewall riots in New York’s Greenwich Village.

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This is the second year in a row that the parade has had an official celebrity grand marshal. Last year it was Bravo TV’s executive vice president of programming Andy Cohen, known as the referee in those Real Housewivesreunions. This year’s celeb is Jonathan Lovitz, one of the match-makers on LOGO TV’s reality series Setup Squad (we’re sensing a reality-TV pattern. Next year, Tim Gunn?). Last year Lovitz famously refused to stand jury duty, saying he couldn’t be an impartial judge of others while being considered a second-class citizen under the law (he’s also considered “sexy”).

The festival runs 1 to 7 p.m. in the Montrose area. The parade runs 8:15 to 11 p.m. on Westheimer, starting at Dunlavy and ending at Crocker. For information, visit pridehouston.org/events.
Sat., June 25, 1-11 p.m., 2011