Janeane Marie Garofalo is an American actress, comedian and former co-host on Air America Radio’s The Majority Report. She is best known for gracing the audience on stage with her unique mix of deadpan cynicism and sense of heartfelt conviction.

JANEANE GAROFALO BIOGRAPHY: AGE, EARLY LIFE, FAMILY, EDUCATION

Janeane Garofalo was born on September 28, 1964 (Janeane Garofalo age: 58) in Newton, New Jersey. Her mother, Joan Garofalo, was a secretary employed in the petrochemical industry, who died of cancer when Garofalo was 24 years old. Her father, Carmine Garofalo, is a former executive at Exxon.

Garofalo comes from Irish and Italian ancestry. She was raised in numerous places across the United States, including Madison, New Jersey; Ontario, California; and Houston, Texas. She graduated high school in Texas, but has publicly announced her distaste for growing up in Houston, primarily because of the great emphasis placed on prettiness and sports in high school, and because of the sweltering heat and high humidity.

Garofalo attended Providence College in Rhode Island, where she entered into a comedy talent search sponsored by Showtime and earned herself the distinguished title of “Funniest Person in Rhode Island.”

Despite her early success, Garofalo did struggle to get going at times, her original gimmick of reading off her hand unsuccessful in later performances.

Garofalo graduated from college with degrees in American Studies and History, becoming a professional stand-up comedian in the hopes of earning a role on the writing staff of the talk show Late Night With David Letterman. She faced difficulties for a number of years, even spending a brief period of time as a bike messenger in Boston.

JANEANE GAROFALO BIOGRAPHY: CAREER

Garofalo officially started her career performing in stand-up comedy before dabbling with some films and eventually carving herself a breakthrough role in the romance/drama film Reality Bites, where she portrayed Winona Ryder‘s best friend Vickie.

In an exclusive interview with uInterview, Garofalo revealed how she managed to play a computer genius in the American drama series 24, despite stating that she didn’t know how to use one in her hit comedy special, Janeane Garofalo: If You Will.

“I did know how to use one and I just opted to stop using one,” Garofalo admitted. “I did use a computer. I have one in my home and used it like anyone does, and then I realized I really can’t stand this. And I really can’t stand all this e-mail that you can never get your arms around. I can’t stand all this junk information. I mean, I know it’s a great democratic medium and there’s wonderful, wonderful things on it, but there’s also a lot of garbage that will destroy you on it. And you can’t help but go down some of these rabbit holes sometimes. And there’s also a real culture of cruelty on it, for some reason. A lot of people taking terrible potshots at other people and just stuff like that. Everyone’s a critic, whether it comes to cultural things, political things, whatever it is. Also the surveillance. You know, we live in such a surveillance society anyway, I really feel that through your computer you have just opened up everything to anyone in perpetuity. And I don’t like that. Now, granted, it doesn’t really mean much that I’ve shut my computer down. We are still in a surveillance society, but I do feel a little more protected than people who are online the majority of their day, the majority of their lives.”

It was mentioned that this was Garofalo’s first comedy special in about a decade, and when asked why she’d decided to do it, this is what Garofalo had to say:

“Oh, just because they asked,” Garofalo answered. “Somebody asked me, so I was like, ‘Sure.’ I didn’t know there was an interest in somebody doing it, so I was very flattered. I was gonna do one with Shell Factory also a few years ago, and then I got scared because I thought, nobody’s interested, you know? I mean, I don’t know if there’s anyone who would be interested in watching a special of mine. And also, I don’t do well under those kinds of pressure situations, stand-up wise. I always feel it’s sometimes like a homework assignment because the people shooting the special want to know what you’re gonna say and exactly how you’re gonna say it! And I tend to crack under that kind of pressure because I don’t like to have it so written in stone. I prefer to try and create an atmosphere where it is much more open-ended or there’s a feeling that the audience and I are just discussing this for maybe the first time. It’s hard to do that in a special because the people who are producing your special don’t like to fly by the seat of their pants like that. So, it’s been hard for me over the years to get up the nerve to do a special, but then as I said, it’s not like there was a ton of people knocking down my door to do one. I was really flattered when EPIX asked, so I did it.”

JANEANE GAROFALO BIOGRAPHY: PERSONAL LIFE

Garofalo struggled with alcohol for a time, but has stated in a recent interview that she gave up drinking back in 2001. 

She married Robert Cohen in Las Vegas in 1991. She later went on to explain how it was only intended to be a joke, the couple thinking their marriage was nonbinding since it had not been filed by a local courthouse. It was only discovered later, when Cohen tried marrying someone else, that their marriage had indeed been legal. They officially divorced one another in 2012, and Garofalo got remarried (on purpose this time) to  Brody Tate in April 2015.

 

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