LaWanda Page was raised in St. Louis, Missouri. She began her career in show business working small nightclubs, billed as “The Bronze Goddess of Fire,” an act which included her eating fire and lighting cigarettes with her fingertips. She performed the cigarette feat on an episode of Sanford and Son, in which Fred held a circus in his front yard.LaWanda Page and Redd Foxx were very close childhood friends. They attended school and grew up together in St. Louis. Later on, they both entered the field of comedy separately and performed stage acts.
During her tenure as a stand-up comic, which lasted well into the 1990s, she LaWanda Page was often called The Queen of Comedy, or in some mainstream circles, The Black Queen of Comedy. Other than the expletive-free Sane Advice album, released two years after the run of Sanford and Son, most of Page’s albums and stand-up material were raunchy in nature.
On Sanford and Son, the character Aunt Esther was the sister of Fred Sanford’s late wife Elizabeth. Before getting the role, Page had already been performing her comedy routine in nightclubs in St. Louis and then Los Angeles for several years. When the show was being cast, Redd Foxx told one of the https://www.sihspune.org/propecia.php producers about Page. The producer had heard of her as he himself had previously caught her act. Foxx telephoned Page in St. Louis and asked her to read for the role of Aunt Esther. Page auditioned for the role and was offered the part.
But, before any taping had begun, producers noticed during rehearsals that Page was unfamiliar with the ins-and-outs of producing a television sitcom; she had been more accustomed to performing in nightclubs. One of Sanford and Son?’?s producers told Foxx that he will need to fire Page and hold auditions again for the Aunt Esther role so that taping could begin. Foxx insisted Page play the part and he threatened to walk away from the show if she was let go. The producers stuck with Page, who would go on to become one of the most famous television personalities of the 1970s.
Though the show was Foxx’s vehicle, the strong portrayal of the Aunt Esther character by Page allowed her to hold her own against Sanford. The character of Esther was in direct contrast to the raunchy, expletive-filled material of Page’s stand-up comedy act and record albums. Page died of complications from diabetes on September 14, 2002.
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