LaWanda Page

Page began her show business career at age 15 in St. Louis, where she learned how to fire dance.[10] Swallowing fire, lighting matches and cigarettes with her fingertips, and walking over flames were part of Page's entertaining bag of tricks.[3][11][9] She burned herself frequently in her early days, though never badly.[12][13] But, as she told journalist Vashti McKenzie at the Baltimore Afro-American, "if I had to burn to make a living, I was willing to burn".[12] Billed as "The Bronze Goddess of Fire" or "LaWanda, the Flame Goddess", Page entertained small St. Louis nightclubs. She later described one East St. Louis club where she worked as "the kind of place where if you ain’t home by nine o’clock at night you can be declared legally dead. [Everybody] walked around with knives in there. You better had one, too—knife or gun or something!"[14] At some point, Page moved to Los Angeles, California. The exact year she moved is unknown, though she likely moved sometime in the 1950s.[15] Once there, Page took a gig dancing and waiting tables at the Brass Rail Club for 15 years.[9] She also toured her fire dancing act and made appearances at nightclubs across the country[16] and world, including Canada, Brazil, and Japan.[17]

It is unknown when and where Page began stand-up comedy. She may have been introduced to stand-up while dancing at the Brass Rail Club in Los Angeles. According to an interview in the Philadelphia Tribune, Page did not like comedy at first, but a fellow Brass Rail Club employee and member of the comedy duo Skillet & Leroy saw Page's potential, telling her: "you can do comedy. As a matter of fact, if you don’t do comedy you can’t work here".[15] Page may have also been introduced to stand-up while touring the Chitlin' Circuit, where she shared stages with noted comedians such as Redd Foxx and Richard Pryor.[6] No matter how or when she transitioned to comedy from dance, it was in Los Angeles that Page started honing the feisty approach to comedy that would make her famous.[6] In the mid-1960s Page became a member of the comedy group Skillet, Leroy & Co. (before Page joined, the group was a duo known as Skillet & Leroy). Skillet was Ernest "Skillet" Mayhand (1916–2007) and Leroy was Wilbert LeRoy Daniel (1928–1993).[15] During her tenure as a stand-up comic, a career she continued into the 1990s, Page often was billed as "The Queen of Comedy" or "The Black Queen of Comedy".[3]

Page recorded five live solo comedy albums for the Laff Records label and several other collaborative live comedy albums with comedy group Skillet, Leroy & Co. in the late 1960s and early 1970s[2] under her LaWanda Page stage name (she often went just by her first name, sometimes styled as La Wanda).[18] Other than the relatively clean Sane Advice album, released two years after the run of Sanford and Son, Page's albums and stand-up material were raunchy blue comedy in nature. One release, a gold-selling album called Watch It, Sucker!, was titled after one of her Aunt Esther character's catchphrases in order to capitalize on her newfound television fame.[1] Page used the catchphrase again for the title of her 1982 stand-up tour, "The Watch It Sucker Review". When the New Pittsburgh Courier wondered why "'Aunt Esther' might do a show like this", Page explained that she was not on tour because she needed the money; rather, she toured because she wanted to meet Aunt Esther's fans and perform her own stand up. In that, Page succeeded: the New Pittsburg Courier reviewed the show as "full of laughter and enjoyed by the large group who attended".[19] Page also performed as herself after her Sanford and Son fame. On numerous occasions from 1976 to 1978, Page appeared as a stand-up comedian on Dean Martin Celebrity Roast, where she roasted celebrities like Frank Sinatra,[20] Betty White, and Jimmy Stewart.[21] In 1985, Page performed a raunchy set in the all-women stand-up special Women Tell the Dirtiest Jokes. Also included in the film were sets from Lois Bromfield, Marsha Warfield, Patty Rosborough, Jo Ann Dearing, Carole Montgomery, Judy Tenuta, and Barbara Scott.[22]

Page had been performing her comedy routine in nightclubs in St. Louis and Los Angeles for several years, but had planned to leave show business to move back to St. Louis to take care of her ailing mother. But a phone call from Redd Foxx in 1972 changed Page's mind. Earlier that year, the sitcom Sanford and Son, starring Foxx as Fred Sanford, had premiered on NBC. A man known for his generosity,[1] Foxx brought his childhood friend Page to the attention of one of the show's producers, who was already familiar with Page and her act.[23] Then, Foxx called Page to ask her to read for the role of Esther Anderson ("Aunt Esther"), the sister of Fred Sanford's late wife Elizabeth. At first, Page thought Foxx was playing a joke, and hung up—twice. But once Foxx convinced her that he was being serious, she auditioned and was offered the role. However, prior to taping, producers became concerned when Page, whose experience was limited primarily to nightclub stages, seemed to have difficulty working in a sitcom format. Eventually, one of the show's producers told Foxx that Page would need to be fired and that another actor would need to be cast before the show could begin taping. Foxx responded by insisting that Page keep the part, even threatening to walk away from the show if Page were fired.[1] Besides Foxx's generosity, he knew Page would be a fantastic fit for the Aunt Esther role, saying that: "you never heard of the lady, but the night that first show of LaWanda's goes on the air, there'll be dancing in the streets in every ghetto in the United States".[24] The producers relented and, after joining the series for the second season, Page's Aunt Esther went on to become one of the most popular TV sitcom characters of the 1970s.[25] Atlanta Daily World celebrated Page's success as a "Cinderella story come true",[23] and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette described Page's Aunt Esther as “a key ingredient” on Sanford and Son who “isn’t afraid of heathen Fred. She browbeats him at every turn in the tradition of God-fearing sisters who have seen the light and seek to quench the devil in a fun-loving man".[11] Ron Miller at the Boston Globe listed Page as his eighth pick for his “Top Ten of TV’s lovable jerks” round-up.[26]

Page's Aunt Esther was a combination of devout churchgoer and tough-as-nails realist, unafraid to state whatever was on her mind. While her relationship with Foxx's character, Fred Sanford, was usually confrontational, she portrayed a tender side when it came to her nephew Lamont Sanford (played by Demond Wilson). Common issues between brother-in-law and sister-in-law were Sanford's lack of business success and lukewarm religious faith. Sometimes, primarily because of their shared love for Lamont and the late Elizabeth, the two adversaries managed to find common ground. Although Sanford and Son was clearly Foxx's vehicle, Page's Aunt Esther could hold her own against the show's star. The church-going act of Esther was a highly praised contrast to the raunchy, expletive-filled material of Page's live act and records.[11]

Sanford and Son ran for six seasons. After the sixth season, Foxx and his co-star Wilson left the show over unfair treatment and pay disputes with the network, leading to Sanford and Son’s cancellation in 1977.[24]

Page continued her role as Aunt Esther on Sanford and Son spin-off Sanford Arms, which followed a new lead character, Phil Wheeler (Theodore Wilson). But without Foxx nor Demond Wilson, Sanford Arms received low ratings and was cancelled after four episodes.[27] A review in Variety noted that Page “is a genuinely funny lady, but she looked considerably better when she had Foxx to work with and against. Restraint is not her stock in trade, and [Theodore] Wilson is an inadequate counterbalance”.[28] In 1980 NBC ran another spin-off of Sanford and Son called Sanford, which ignored entirely the events of Sanford Arms. Foxx returned to play Fred Sanford, but Demond Wilson did not return to portray Lamont Sanford. Page joined the series in 1981 for its second season to reprise her role as Aunt Esther. However, Sanford was plagued with low viewership and ratings, and NBC ultimately cancelled the series mid-season in 1981.[1]

In 1977, Page appeared in an episode of The Love Boat titled "A Tasteful Affair; Oh, Dale!; The Main Event" alongside Sherman Hemsley. Page also appeared on several episodes of The Dean Martin Celebrity Roasts, and over the next two decades occasionally guest-starred in episodes of other popular television shows, including Amen, Martin, 227, Family Matters and Diff'rent Strokes. Page co-starred as Charlene Jenkins in the short-lived 1979 series Detective School. She appeared on Circus of the Stars as a fire eater. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, she appeared in a series of comical Church's Chicken television commercials featuring the catchphrase "Gotta love it!".[29] She appeared on several tracks of the debut album by RuPaul titled Supermodel of the World released in 1993, most notably the hit song "Supermodel (You Better Work)". She also appeared in several music videos from the album. Among her movie credits are appearances in Zapped! (1982), Good-bye, Cruel World (1983), Mausoleum (1983), where in one scene the producers inserted the opening song to Sanford & Son to honor her legacy, the Steve Martin film My Blue Heaven (1990), as an extremely foul-mouthed clown in Bobcat Goldthwait's 1991 comedy Shakes the Clown, CB4 (1993), a cameo appearance in the 1995 movie Friday, stealing the opening scene with a one-liner, Don't Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood (1996), and a recurring role as Ms. Porter during the first season of the 1990s television sitcom, Martin.[21]