MAME is a musical with a book by Jerome Lawrence and Robert Edwin Lee and music and lyrics by Jerry Herman. Originally titled My Best Girl, it is based on the 1955 novel Auntie Mame by Patrick Dennis and a 1956 Broadway play, by Lawrence and Lee, that had starred Rosalind Russell. Set in New York and spanning the Great Depression and World War II, it focuses on eccentric bohemian, Mame Dennis, whose famous motto is "Life is a banquet and most poor sons-of-bitches are starving to death." Her fabulous life with her wealthy friends is interrupted when the young son of her late brother arrives to live with her. They cope with the Depression in a series of adventures. The 1966 Broadway production became a hit and spawned a 1974 movie version with Lucille Ball in the title role, as well as a London production, a Broadway revival and a 40th anniversary revival at the Kennedy Center in 2006.