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Actress Barbara Chisholm turns an ironing board into a makeshift desk, complete with an electric typewriter.

As she plops on the bed behind it, she dispenses bits of Erma Bombeck's wit and wisdom to a sold-out audience, many of whom grew up on a diet of her columns and books.

"If life is a bowl of cherries, what am I doing in the pits?" she laments as she brings the celebrated humorist to life in the world premiere of "Erma Bombeck: At Wit's End" at Arena Stage in Washington, D.C., as part of the Women's Voices Theater Festival.

The stakes are high for Chisholm's performance this night. The audience for the one-woman show includes Bombeck's family, literary agent, longtime assistant, former "Good Morning America" producer and the playwrights, Margaret and Allison Engel.

"Erma is one of my heroes of all time," Chisholm told the family after receiving a standing ovation. "Thank you for allowing me to introduce new people to her."

At the height of her career, Bombeck's "At Wit's End" column appeared in more than 900 newspapers, reaching 30 million readers. Her entertaining essays hung on refrigerator doors around the country because they captured so perfectly the foibles of family life. She's arguably the most famous graduate of the University of Dayton, which honors her legacy through the popular biennial Erma Bombeck Writers' Workshop.

In an onstage discussion with the playwrights after the show, literary agent Aaron Priest talked about Bombeck's popularity. "She was a voice for a generation of people who didn't have a voice at that time. She touched a nerve," he said. "She had a natural sense of humor. She was in many, many ways one of the smartest people I've ever known."

Bombeck drew on everyday family life for inspiration - and laughs.

"The mayhem in our house just happened," said her son, Matt Bombeck, a screenwriter in Los Angeles."We never saw the connection between what we did and the column, he said. Pausing, he quipped, "We never made that connection because we never read the column."

His brother, Andy Bombeck, remembered when their mother first appeared on "Johnny Carson."

"The first night she got bumped, so we got to stay up late the next night, too," he said, recalling his surprise at seeing his mother draw laughs on national television. "She was someone who worked at a typewriter all day long, and we couldn't believe it."

Bombeck poked fun at the joys of motherhood and housekeeping during a time of social change for women, drawing a legion of like-minded women as fans. On her own time and expense, she worked tirelessly for the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment, which fell three states short of ratification.

Playwright Margaret Engel called the play a "valentine to Erma and our mother and gave her "a greater sense of appreciation for the work women did in the home. …I felt a sense of sisterhood with her."

To research "At Wit's End," the playwrights read much of Bombeck's immense body of work - thousands of columns and a dozen books - and viewed "Good Morning America" clips from her 11 years on the show. They perused the University of Dayton's online Erma museum for photographs, speeches and other material and interviewed Erma's husband Bill, longtime assistant Norma Born and the three children, Matt, Betsy and Andy.

"I love that people love Erma," said Chisholm, who most recently appeared in the Oscar-winning film "Boyhood." "What I love about the show is that it's an opportunity for her to receive some of the respect that is her due."

Learn more about Chisholm's admiration for Erma Bombeck in this interview.

"Erma Bombeck: At Wit's End" runs through Nov. 8. For information and tickets, click here.

- Teri Rizvi

Teri Rizvi is the founder and co-director of the Erma Bombeck Writers' Workshop at the University of Dayton, where she also serves as executive director of strategic communications. (Photo of Barbara Chisholm by C. Stanley Photography. Illustration by Ed Fotheringham. Courtesy of Arena Stage.)