Buttoned-up image is a goner

Don't let the investment banker moniker fool you. Bobby Tudor, Tudor Pickering & Holt CEO, can shake his booty.

Just ask the the 250 guests at his 50th birthday bash on Saturday night. The towering, one-time pro basketball player never left the dance floor in his "Club 50" party tent at Hermann Park. We attribute the boogie fever partly to the band — Atlanta's hot, hot, hot Party on the Moon — and partly to the fact that the investment banker was born in Louisiana, where juking and jiving come naturally. Phoebe Tudor, the birthday boy's wife, also a Louisiana native, did her share of uninhibited booty shaking as well.

The riotous partying came after a genteel start to the night that saw the Tudors welcoming a heady contingent including Andrea and Mayor Bill White, the Baker Institute's Ed Djerejian and wife Francoise, U.S. District Judge Lee Rosenthal and husband Gary, Kinder Morgan honcho Rich Kinder and wife Nancy, Rice University board chair Jim Crownover and wife Molly, social icon Lynn Wyatt, the Menil Collection's Vance Muse and Houston Ballet's C.C. Connor.

It was a no-expense-spared evening with the tent fantastically decorated by Rebekah Johnson and a staggering array of scrumptious food stations by Jackson & Co. Each place that Bobby Tudor has lived was represented in food and decor, overseen by culinary maestro Jackson Hicks.

Houston, of course, had Tex-mex offerings and lamb chops while the food station for Nantucket (where the Tudors summer) featured lobster, oysters and clam chowder. New York was represented by beef tenderloin and the trimmings, London — bangers and mash.  Fried oysters, shrimp creole and crawfish reigned at the Louisiana destination. And from Austria, where Bobby briefly played basketball, there were apple strudel and Sacher torte with requisite whipped cream. Need we say that everyone waddled home. 

Of course, there was so much more to the energized birthday bash including a massive globe-designed cake. But did we mention the 24-foot in diameter ice bar where half a dozen bar tenders served every libation imaginable? Or the video of the birthday boy? Or the fantastic fireworks display over the lake?

As Sallie Ann Hart noted, "I'm so glad to see this party because I thought there was a recession. Obviously, not. I was worried." 

The long list of celebrants included Janet and Paul Hobby, Liz and Tom Glanville, Mimi and Harold Vance, Cynthia and Tony Petrello, Kate and Steve Gibson, Gracie and Bob Cavnar, George Lancaster, Soraya and Scott McClelland, Jay Baker, Kathryn and Jeff Smith, Kate McConnico and Karen and Mel Payne. 

Making their mark on the dance floor were the Tudors three model-perfect children: Caroline, 19; Margaret,18; and Harry, 15. 

• Hermann Park
• Bobby Tudor, Jackson Hicks, Phoebe Tudor, Rebekah Johnson

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