Iola Boylan

Iola Lucille Boylan is a character on the television series Mama's Family. She was played by Beverly Archer.

Television character biography

Iola lives across the street from Thelma Harper and her family. She continues to live with her eccentric parents, Mr. and Mrs. Tommy Boylan, even into middle age, and has known the Harpers most of her life. Her catch phrase is a friendly "knock, knock!" whenever she visits Thelma's house, and she never seems to wear anything but pink gingham, although in three episodes she wore black gingham while in mourning for characters who have died (including her cat, Midnight).

She has a brother, Verne, a niece, Vernette, and a cousin, Vernelia, who works at a child adoption agency in the neighboring town of Hinckley. Thelma's grandson, Bubba always refers to her as "Miss Boylan".

A graduate in home economics, Iola is a whiz at homemaking and is also known for her absolutely ridiculous handicrafts, which include coat-hanger birdcages, toilet-paper cozies, and anything made with felt. She has had a huge crush on Vinton Harper ever since they were children (they are roughly the same age), and aims to snare him away from his wife, Naomi Harper. This leads to an acrimonious and somewhat formal relationship between the two women, although the attitude between them becomes friendlier once Naomi gets pregnant. She also didn't much get along well with Vint's sister Eunice Harper Higgins as was evidenced in a flashback, which was shown that she'd lived across from the Harpers her entire life.

Usually, Iola is often the only other person that Thelma spends time with, outside of her family. They are often involved in civic work together, most notably the Church Ladies League (CLL). Invariably, Iola often visits the family around mealtime and sits down to eat dinner with them, much to the rest of the family's discomfort.

Although Iola and Thelma are best friends, conflicts would arise between the two and they would bicker and squabble over things (e.g., the position as president of the CLL; a rose-growing contest; a chili contest; the rightful owner of a winning lottery ticket).

Iola often rails about her homebound, morbidly obese mother, and her even more eccentric father, who are both referred to but never seen on-screen. In spite of it all, she truly does love her family, and by extension, the Harper family as well.

When first introduced Iola seemed to be an antagonist for Mama (such as when she suspected Bubba of stealing her pearls), but this role was quickly dropped. It was also never explained if Iola ever had a job outside of the house or rather if she spent her whole life looking after her (mostly) invalid mother and father. Several times Iola alludes to selling her handicrafts, and once almost got a job as an inventor. Iola frequently claimed she was a "Daddy's girl" and once even said she didn't need a man to buy her things or take her places as her father did this.