When Jackie Mabley was growing up one child of many in a poor Southern family, her mother told her she would have to leave North Carolina in order to make something of herself. Mabley took her mother's advice to heart, overcoming great odds to become not only a widely recognized and successful stand-up comic, but also the unforgettable "Moms," an African-American archetype with too much common sense and sensuality to take herself too seriously. Dressed in her flamboyant signature outfit of Hawaiian shirt over a housedress with bright socks, floppy slippers, and a hat she crocheted herself, Moms Mabley called her audience her "children." She entertained them with raunchy jokes and devilish playfulness, punctuating her act with bulging eyes and a toothless leer. In an entertainment industry where African-American women continue to receive little recognition, Moms Mabley's 60-year career stands as a role model...