Emmy-winning television comedian Vicki Lawrence is bringing her long-running stage production, Vicki Lawrence and Mama: A Two-Woman Show, to The Factory in Chesterfield on February 21.
The date gives St. Louis-area fans of classic television a rare chance to see two of Lawrence’s best-known personas in one night: the performer herself, and Thelma “Mama” Harper, the sharp-tongued matriarch she created on The Carol Burnett Show and later starred as on Mama’s Family.
Lawrence was still a teenager when Carol Burnett hired her for the CBS variety series that ran from 1967 to 1978. In the show’s seventh season she introduced Mama in a sketch called “The Family.” What was meant as a one-off bit became a recurring favorite, and the character later anchored Mama’s Family, which aired on NBC and then in first-run syndication through 1990. Reruns have kept Harper in living rooms for decades.
The touring show is built in two halves. Lawrence opens with stand-up, songs, and autobiographical stories — how she was cast out of high school, how Mama was born, and how a 1973 recording of “The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia” became a No. 1 hit. She has long said the first act is not a greatest-hits recap. “My show is not a retrospective,” she has told venues. “The show is a mixture of stand-up comedy, music and my observations about real life.”
After that, Mama takes the stage. Lawrence has been touring some version of the two-woman format since 2001, updating the material so the character can comment on the present instead of living only in 1980s syndication. “I think people will get a kick out of the things Mama has an opinion about,” she has said. “We’re creating new material with a more modern and cutting edge. Where Mama is concerned, expect the unexpected.”
That combination — behind-the-scenes television history plus a still-working comic character — is why the show has stayed on the road for more than two decades. Lawrence also later co-starred on Fox’s The Cool Kids (2018–19) with David Alan Grier, Martin Mull, and Leslie Jordan, another reminder that her career never stopped at one sketch.
The Factory, at 17105 North Outer 40 Road in Chesterfield, is a 3,000-capacity hall in The District, just off I-64 at Boone’s Crossing. Parking is free. Tickets are typically sold through Ticketmaster and the venue box office; check The Factory’s site or Ticketmaster for showtimes, seating, and current pricing as the date approaches.
For viewers who grew up on Burnett sketches, Mama’s Family, or both, the Chesterfield stop is a live television reunion of a different kind: the actress who built the character, and the character who never quite left the room.
