Righteous Benefit for Lupus Foundation

They haven’t lost that lovin’ feeling.

No way. After 30 years of harmonizing, the Righteous Brothers proved they were still in tune on Monday night during their benefit concert following the first Bobby Hatfield Celebrity Golf Classic at Los Coyotes Country Club in Buena Park.

Besides a slew of other nostalgic ditties--”Ebb Tide,” and “That Lovin’ Feelin’, “ among them--Hatfield crooned “Unchained Melody” (revived as the theme of the blockbuster movie, “Ghost”) and Bill Medley sang “(I’ve Had) the Time of My Life” from the mega-hit film, “Dirty Dancing.”

“Both of those movies starred Patrick Swayze,” noted Medley, who’d came from Reno for the fund-raiser for the Lupus Foundation of America. “We made him what he is today! I think that needed to be said.” Whistles from the 300-strong crowd. Applause. Foot stomping.

“He’s got a new movie out (“City of Joy”) and we’re not in it! And is it a hit?” Medley joked. (Nawwwwww, guests yelled.)

Sitting on the sidelines and looking like a celebrity herself--though she claimed otherwise, “the cortisone puffs me up”--was Hatfield’s wife, Linda, a lupus patient.

“I was diagnosed 13 years ago,” she said. “It’s a devastating illness; but I got lucky and was in remission for four years.” Until three weeks ago. “It just hit me out of the blue. We were on vacation in Lake Arrowhead and one morning I couldn’t get out of bed, I had such stiffness and pain in my joints.

“The disease is horrible that way. You don’t know from day to day how you’re going to feel. Thank God for my husband and two children. They care, do all of my running for me.”

The day before the event, Linda feared she might not be able to make it to the party, Bobby Hatfield said.

“All too often, I hear my kids say: ‘Is Mom going to get up today?’ ” he said.

“I tell them that if she does, that will be great. And if she doesn’t, well, that’s OK too.”

But not really. More than anything, Hatfield wants to see his wife beat the illness that has plagued their lives. There is no known cure.

So he created a golf tourney--sure to be an annual event--and combined it with a barbecue and concert to bring attention to the disease. Comedian Brad Garrett also performed.

“The main thing is to make people aware of lupus,” Hatfield said pre-showtime. “No one seems to know about it. This is one way to help.”

More than 500,000 Americans have lupus, a chronic auto-immune disease that strikes mostly women in their childbearing years.

Carolyn Goode was event chairwoman. Linda Hatfield and Ida McAuley were her co-chairwomen. Television sportscaster Ed Arnold was emcee. Also among guests was Kerryn Coffman, president of the Lupus Foundation of America’s Southern California chapter.