Stand-up Comedy
DeGeneres started performing stand-up comedy at small clubs and coffee houses. By 1981 she was the emcee at Clyde's Comedy Club in New Orleans. DeGeneres cites Woody Allen and Steve Martin as her main influences at this time. In the early 1980s she began to tour nationally, being named Showtime's Funniest Person in America in 1982. In 1986 she appeared for the first time on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, who likened her to Bob Newhart. When Carson invited her over for an onscreen chat after her performance, she became the first comedienne in the show's history to be treated this way.
Read more about this topic: Ellen DeGeneres
Famous quotes containing the word comedy:
“Unless comedy touches me as well as amuses me, it leaves me with a sense of having wasted my evening. I go to the theatre to be moved to laughter, not to be tickled or bustled into it.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)