Moms Mabley

Moms Mabley
Birth name	Loretta Mary Aiken
Born	(1894-03-19)March 19, 1894 Brevard, North Carolina, U.S.
Died	May 23, 1975(1975-05-23) (aged 81) White Plains, New York, U.S.
Medium	vaudeville, television, stand-up, film
Nationality	United States
Years active	1909–1975
Genres	Social satire
Influenced	Bing Crosby Phyllis Diller Whoopi Goldberg Bernie Mac Richard Pryor Sarah Silverman Wanda Sykes

Jackie "Moms" Mabley, born Loretta Mary Aiken (March 19, 1894 – May 23, 1975) was an American standup comedian and a pioneer of the so-called "Chitlin' Circuit" of African-American vaudeville.

Biography

Early years

Mabley was born in Brevard, North Carolina. Although she always claimed a birthdate of 1894 and that she was one of a family of twenty children, the 1900 Federal Census shows "Loretter Aiken" in Brevard was born in March 1897 and was the youngest of four (out of five) surviving children of James P. and Mary Aiken. Her father owned and operated several businesses, while her mother kept house and took in boarders. Her father died in an accident when Loretta was eleven. In 1910, her mother took over their primary business, a general store.

James Aiken's father, Henry Aiken, was part white. His mother, Bettie, was able to read and write in the 1870 census, five years after the abolition of slavery, which suggests she may have been a free woman of color. Loretta Mabley's genealogist, D. Richmond, wrote: "She has a very interesting lineage worth researching."

By the age of fifteen, Mabley had been raped twice and had two children who were given up for adoption. She was pressured by her stepfather to marry a much older man^{[citation needed]}, but was encouraged by her grandmother to strike out on her own. Mabley ran away to Cleveland, Ohio, joining a traveling minstrel show, where she sang and entertained.

Career

She took her stage name, Jackie Mabley, from an early boyfriend, commenting to Ebony in a 1970s interview that he'd taken so much from her, it was the least she could do to take his name. Later she became known as "Moms" because she was indeed a "Mom" to many other comedians on the circuit in the 1950s and 1960s. She came out as a lesbian at the age of twenty-seven, becoming one of the first triple-X rated comedians on the comedy circuit.

During the 1920s and 1930s she appeared in androgynous clothing (as she did in the film version of The Emperor Jones with Paul Robeson) and recorded several of her early "lesbian stand-up" routines. Mabley was one of the top women doing stand-up in her heyday, eventually recording more than 20 albums of comedy routines. She appeared in movies, on television, and in clubs, and performed at the Michigan Women's Festival shortly before her death in 1975.

Performing on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour in 1968.

Mabley was one of the most successful entertainers of the Chitlin' circuit, earning US$10,000 a week at Harlem's Apollo Theater at the height of her career. She made her New York City debut at Connie's Inn in Harlem. In the 1960s, she become known to a wider white audience, playing Carnegie Hall in 1962, and making a number of mainstream TV appearances, particularly her multiple appearances on the The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour when that CBS show was the number one show on television in the late 1960s, which introduced her to a whole new Boomer audience.

Mabley was billed as "The Funniest Woman in the World"; she tackled topics too edgy for many other comics of the time, including racism. One of her regular themes was a romantic interest in handsome young men rather than old "washed-up geezers," and she got away with it courtesy of her stage persona, where she appeared as a toothless, bedraggled woman in a house dress and floppy hat. She also added the occasional satirical song to her jokes, and her cover version of "Abraham, Martin and John" hit #35 on the Hot 100 on 19 July 1969. At 75 years and 4 months old, Moms Mabley became the oldest person ever to have a US Top 40 hit.

She is the subject of a documentary called Moms Mabley: I Got Somethin’ to Tell You, produced and directed by Whoopi Goldberg, to air in Autumn 2013 on HBO.

Family

She had four children (aside from the two who were given up for adoption when she was a teenager) and five grandchildren.

Death

Mabley died in White Plains, New York in 1975 at the White Plains Hospital where she had been a patient for six weeks, from heart failure. She was survived by her children, Bonnie, Christine, Charles, and Yvonne Ailey. Funeral services were held at Harlem's Abyssinian Baptist Church. She is interred at Ferncliff Cemetery, Hartsdale, New York.

Work

Stage

• Bowman's Cotton Blossoms (1919)
• Look Who's Here (1927)
• Miss Bandana (1927)
• Fast and Furious (musical) (1931)
• Blackberries of 1932 (1932)
• The Joy Boat (1930s)
• Sidewalks of Harlem (1930s)
• Red Pastures (1930s)
• Swingin' the Dream (1939)

Filmography

• The Emperor Jones (1933)
• Killer Diller (1948)
• Boarding House Blues (1948)
• The Cincinnati Kid (1965)
• It's Your Thing (1970) (documentary)
• Amazing Grace (1974)

Discography

• 1961 On Stage (Funniest Woman in the World)
• 1961 Moms Mabley at the "UN"
• 1961 Moms Mabley at The Playboy Club
• 1962 Moms Mabley Breaks It Up
• 1962 Moms Mabley at Geneva Conference
• 1963 I Got Somethin' to Tell You!
• 1963 Young Men, Sí - Old Men, No
• 1964 Moms the Word
• 1964 Out on a Limb
• 1964 The Funny Sides of Moms Mabley [Chess]
• 1964 Moms Wows
• 1964 Best of Moms and Pigmeat, Vol. 1

• 1965 Men in My Life
• 1965 Now Hear This
• 1966 Moms Mabley at the White House
• 1968 Best of Moms Mabley
• 1969 The Youngest Teenager
• 1969 Her Young Thing
• 1970 Live at Sing Sing
• 1972 I Like 'em Young
• 1994 Live at the Apollo
• 1994 The Funny Sides of Moms Mabley [Jewel]
• 1994 Live at the Ritz
• 2004 Comedy Ain't Pretty

Television

• 1967 The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour
• 1969 The Ed Sullivan Show
• 1970 The Bill Cosby Show

External links

• Agitation in Moderation: The Moms Mabley Story by Kliph Nesteroff
• Moms Mabley at Find a Grave
• Moms Mabley at the Internet Broadway Database
• Moms Mabley at the Internet Movie Database