Leisure

FEATURE : The Two Faces Of VickiLawrence credits Burnett with believing in her talent as a comedienne,even though she was not a polished actress when they first met.copies and hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts and earned agold disc as well. She also talks about the days when she had anEmmy-nominated talk show for two seasons, simply called Vicki!“Carol told me I would have made my way to Hollywood one way oranother,” Lawrence said. “She told me ‘all I did was open the door— all you had to do was walk through.’”Lawrence compares being on the Burnett show to “going to theHarvard School of Comedy in front of America”, where she was ableto develop the character of “Mama” further, eventually leading herinto her own sitcom Mama’s Family in 1983, a few years after theCarol Burnett show went off the air.In the years that Mama’s Family was on the air, Lawrence looselybased her character on mothers and mother-in-laws she knew atthe time.“I think everyone has her [Mama] in their family. She is a lot likeArchie Bunker,” Lawrence said. “Everyone has one of those in theirfamily, no one ever fesses up to being an Archie Bunker, but sheis like your old crazy aunt that says the most outrageous things atthe Thanksgiving table and everyone is laughing, thinking, ‘Oh myGod, can you believe she said that?’”Lawrence said her material as Vicki is as abundant as for “Mama”,and she loves every minute of it.Love for Long BeachWhen she is not on the road, Lawrence is at her Naples Island homeprepping for the next show and spending time with her pups — Tasha,a chocolate Labrador, and Lucas, a petit basset griffon vendeen.She said she enjoys coming home to her peaceful neighborhoodthat she never takes for granted.In 1986, she and her husband of 36 years, Al Schultz, once a make-upartist on The Carol Burnett Show, decided to settle on Naples Islandrather than in Hollywood or Beverly Hills for the quality of life andthe ability to look out at the ocean now and then.The couple and their two children — Courtney, now 35, and Garrett,now 33 — had moved from Hidden Hills, California, to Maui aftergetting married, but always remembered the pleasant backdrop ofthe ocean in Long Beach, where they visited on numerous yacht trips.Although the show went off the air in 1990, “Mama” has madecountless appearances in casinos and performing arts centers allover the country. She even penned her own book in 2008, titledMama For President: Good Lord, Why Not? with funny quips oneverything from immigration to foreign relations.Lawrence calls “Mama” her opportunity to be her own version ofChris Rock by ruffling some feathers when she can. In her twowomanshow, she has brought “Mama” into the the current centuryby having her discuss such diverse topics that include the recentTiger Woods scandal to toilets that flush three times to womenputting their makeup on while driving.When putting her show together, Lawrence said she did not want itto be retrospective, but rather forward-thinking and relevant. Whenit came to “Mama”, she also wanted to make sure people don’tforget her as the real woman behind the character.“I knew I wanted to be me for half of the show before I am not meanymore, while I still look like me,” Lawrence said. “Sometimes I feelI could just die and no one would know as long as Mama is around.I need to be me for a minute. I have a lot of good stories to tell.”Some of those stories include how she once had a one-hit record,“The Night the Lights Went Out In Georgia”, which sold over 2 million“If we had been smart we would have come straight to Long Beachand bypassed that whole Hawaii trip. We went to the wrong side ofthe ocean!” Lawrence said.Lawrence notes that her favorite part about living in Long Beach isthat it feels like a small town where everyone knows their neighbors.“This is like living in a resort. There is not a day that I don’t walk thedogs and look around in marvel,” she said.Lawrence has made many local friends and has many local favoriteplaces. She shops at La Bella clothing store, frequents Kelly’s, 555and Open Sesame restaurants, and likes to show off to her Hollywoodfriends when they come visit with an occasional trip to the Pike or aride on the couple’s Duffy boat.“Our friends always say, ‘We had no idea [about everything that LongBeach offers]’. I tell them, ‘Shh, don’t tell anybody,’” Lawrence said.Lawrence has also volunteered her time here, including heading upthe DARE program at her son’s school years ago, and also hostingThe Women’s Breast Center walk for Long Beach Memorial Hospitalmany times.“I love this town,” said Lawrence. “It is a great place to live.”36JUNE 2010 TRAVEL & LEISURE