Mae Laborde was always a star, if you ask me. For most of her life, though, she never caught the break she needed.
But the gods have finally addressed this cruel injustice, and the Fresno native and one-time bookkeeper for the Lawrence Welk Show has broken out in a big way. There she was last Sunday at the Santa Monica YMCA with a "what-took-you-so-long" look on her face as she was honored by admiring friends, dignitaries and, yes, showbiz people.
The occasion?
Her 100th birthday.
Or, if you care to look at it this way, the seventh anniversary of her acting career, which began at 93.
The blessed event was sponsored, rather appropriately, by the Santa Monica Historical Society Museum. Mae was feted as "Queen for a Day" and wore a handsome tiara atop a wave of snow-white hair. My family and I were there because we used to share an alley with Mae when we lived back-to-back in Santa Monica in the late '90s.
"Now, honey," Mae had reminded me in her many, many calls the last few months, "don't forget my birthday party."
Several years ago, when I had eye surgery and began coming to grips with my failing faculties, I went to see Mae for a driving lesson. Although she is too short for half the rides at Disneyland and had to look through rather than over the steering wheel of an Oldsmobile the size of a Rose Parade float, she always drove like a champ.
"It's a speedway out here," she told me at the time, advising that I be sure to drive defensively because "people don't even look where they're going."
When I wrote about Mae's driving tips, a talent agent named Sherri Spillane paid a visit to her and a scene-stealing star was born. My phone would ring day and night, with Mae asking me to accompany her on auditions or shoots. She's been on Bill Maher and Mad TV, where she played Vanna White 40 years in the future, a little cranky but still turning letters on Wheel of Fortune. Mae, it turns out, is perfect for satire, because you can't tell whether she's in on the joke or basking in fame's glow.
She's been in a Ben Stiller movie, she's done commercials for Lexus, Sears and J.P. Morgan Chase and she became an outrageously popular late-night guest on "Talkshow With Spike Feresten," where she played, among other things, the 99-year-old daughter of Sen. John McCain. She also did a skit that "went bonkers," as Feresten described it, becoming the most popular video clip on Hulu.com.
