Heather McMahan Knocks It Out Of The Park in Son I Never Had

In the opening sequence of Heather McMahan’s new special, Son I Never Had, her father does her the honor of escorting her down the staircase for her entrance to her big night. Rather than, according to custom, extending his arm to her for this touching moment, McMahan takes a different approach, descending the stairs with her father’s ashes in tow, encased in an urn, the first of many morbidly hilarious, cheeky, and loud-out-loud-funny moments found in her hour-long performance.

After the sudden and rapid passing of her father due to a late-stage diagnosis of pancreatic cancer, Heather McMahan takes on the role of family patriarch with aplomb. In Son I Never Had, McMahan brings the audience through a series of stories about her late father, their family, her openly grieving on a public stage (read: IG Live), as well as her fertility efforts to start a family of her own.

Much unlike her petite sister and dainty mother, McMahan proudly wears her father’s build on stage, showcasing a beautiful, full figure embossed head-to-toe in Gucci. McMahan celebrates her genes, this inheritance from her father lending itself to a close relationship with him over the years, while illuminating the still-rampant sizeism that exists within society today. For example, for the blazer element included in the sequined pantsuit she donned for the live Netflix taping to fit, a specialty atelier had to sew two jackets together. A ridiculous, yet unfortunately necessary pursuit in a world that favors the emaciated form, McMahan criticizes the body positivity movement, joking about an ideal scenario in which formerly fat celebrities such as Adele, Rebel Wilson, and Khloé Kardashian sit her down at a Cheesecake Factory, out of concern for her hypothetically alarming weight loss. 

Feigning surprise at her fictional friends’ intervention, “What, me? No!” She pulls off the caricature by voguing to the audience for a comically long time, a testament to her command of the stage as well as her ability to poke fun at herself.

Heather McMahan has a way of subverting expectations, bringing audiences along through her way of seeing the world, rewarding us with depth, complexity, and heart in her punchlines that encourage viewers to look at the story in a new light. She possesses an electric wit and the ability to turn a joke on its head for guaranteed laughs.

McMahan regales viewers with fond memories of her late father, including the eponymous anecdote earning the special its name. McMahan also describes the tragic and unexpected way she lost her father to cancer.  She details the total of seven days from prognosis to the end of her father’s life they had together and adds dark humor at every turn.

After sharing that her father bought a casket too small for his frame, McMahan transitions back to talking about the topic of fatphobia. She describes a rather unsavory LuluLemon retreat for which she was invited as an “influencer,” a label she acquired from her quick ascension in Instagram activity during her public displays of grieving, but the luxury athleisure brand failed to supply sizes in their clothes for McMahan to wear while on the outing. Instead, in her gift bag, they provided her with the nylon track suit that they also handed out to the NBA All-Stars in attendance at that retreat.

Suffice it to say, while hanging out and kicking it with the boys around the campfire, she quickly learned that taking as much of an edible as a 7’2” Boston Celtic is never a good idea for any woman. As the anecdote escalates to bodily functions and we reach the special’s climax, McMahan delivers one of the funniest bits in the show.

Closing out the performance with spectacular warmth and affection, she describes her desire to have children as well as her experience with egg freezing and IVF. What women have to go through in fertility treatments is unparalleled, including a series of self-administered shots and vaginal suppositories, but it would all be worth it, she gushes in an effective moment of relatable sincerity, to get to be a mommy. She speaks about her potential for motherhood with earnestness mixed with her usual goofiness, making for a display of authentic vulnerability on stage. Her many fertility efforts did, however, result in the successful creation of one embryo, a baby girl sitting on ice, somewhere. Where? Like any good mother, she doesn’t know, she laughs at herself, near the conclusion of the show, before paying one last tribute to her dad, in a touching moment on his deathbed between father and “son.”