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Employ­ing a style that eschews com­pli­ca­tions and aims for the imme­di­a­cy of pen­cil on paper, she con­structs a biog­ra­phy that, inter­est­ing­ly, isn’t told from the point of view of Elliot. Bagieu’s work here is impact­ful in its sim­plic­i­ty and grace. The ear­ly part of Ellen Cohen’s life sto­ry, before the mega-star­dom that the per­sona of Mama Cass would engen­der, is told mov­ing­ly in a recent­ly released graph­ic biog­ra­phy, Cal­i­for­nia Dreamin’: Cass Elliot Before The Mamas & the Papas, writ­ten and drawn by French car­toon­ist and writer Péné­lope Bagieu. No one’s get­ting fat, ​ ‘cept Mama Cass… And yet, for all the suc­cess she found in her life - through her music, her tele­vi­sion career, and her cura­tion of the great­est tal­ent to ever be found in pop­u­lar music in the sec­ond half of the twen­ti­eth cen­tu­ry - lurk­ing in the shad­ows was an ever-present dark­ness, a des­per­a­tion for love and affec­tion that was all too human.

Her lega­cy as the doyenne of folk brought togeth­er voic­es that con­tin­ue to rever­ber­ate in our hearts and our mem­o­ries.

Though it is her work with The Mamas and the Papas that is often most remem­bered, Elliott her­self lived an incred­i­ble, though all-too-brief life. Noth­ing about ​ “Mama” Cass Elliot, one of the most dynam­ic per­form­ers to emerge from the hal­cy­on days of the groovy six­ties, is unfor­get­table.