‘Friends 4 Cause’ partners with actor for annual holiday basket campaign

“Friends 4 Cause” has partnered with actor Matthew Giuffrida for their annual holiday basket campaign benefitting Lighthouse Children’s Palliative Care and the Galileo Adult Centre in Montreal.

Giuffrida is known for his roles in “Woodland Gray,” “Blood & Treasure,” “Fool Me Once” and “The Gift.”

He also plays several characters in his online skits – Sal, Brudder and Martin. And all those characters were on hand to help “Friends 4 Cause” with their holiday campaign.

“These Christmas baskets are very important,” said Giuffrida as “Brudder”. “Number one, because they’re made with love from the students here at Galileo School and there’s all kinds of stuff that’s like representative of the city, of Italian culture, and just not even that. The holidays and these baskets, bring everybody together.

“That’s the one thing that’s the most important thing, because normally when you’re getting a basket, it’s not like me because I buy the basket to eat all for myself, all everything. But normally when you get a basket, you’re giving it to someone. So you’re getting together, you’re bringing the community together.”

“You’re not just buying the chocolate, pasta sauce, or whatever. You’re buying the time, the effort that they put into these baskets. And that’s what’s important, you understand? So come here, get the basket. Give it to someone,” said Giuffrida as “Martin”.

Autistic students from Galileo Adult Centre are the ones primarily volunteering to assemble these baskets, which help fundraise for their school.

But there’s so much more about autism they want us to know.

“We’re like normal people, but we have different talents. Each talent is hidden and our school brings our talent out,” explained Nancy, an adult with autism. “And we’re capable of a lot of things to do. Not just some people put us aside because we have autism, it’s not true. We could keep doing a lot of things.”

For more information or to order a gift basket, visit the Friends 4 Cause website.