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A petite (5'1") dark-haired smartly cynical comedian and actress, Janeane (pronounced JAH-neen) Garofalo began her career performing standup material at "open mike" nights in East Coast nightclubs. After winning a cable TV contest to find the funniest person in Rhode Island and graduating from Providence College, she settled in Boston where she held odd jobs (i.e., bike messenger, receptionist at a heath club) while pursuing a career as a comic. Garofalo found limited success until she moved to Los Angeles in late 1989. Receiving early exposure on MTV's "Half Hour Comedy Hour", she found her neurotic hipster persona and sometimes controversial observations on pop culture appealed to her contemporaries. Meeting actor-director Ben Stiller in an L.A. deli also proved fortuitous as he tapped Garofalo to be a member of the ensemble of his Fox comedy-variety series in 1992. Simultaneously, she landed the role of the acerbic talent booker Paula on the superior HBO sitcom "The Larry Sanders Show". Although the Stiller show only lasted for 13 episodes (Fox aired only 12 with the final one later showing up on Comedy Central in 1995), Garofalo found herself in demand. She briefly was a regular cast member of NBC's "Saturday Night Live" before serving as a special correspondent for Michael Moore's "TV Nation" (NBC, 1994) and hosting and co-producing "Comedy Product" (Comedy Central, 1995). Garofalo headlined her own HBO special in 1995 and continued to lend her sardonic wit to awards shows (and "The Larry Sanders Show") throughout the decade. In 1997, she made a rare dramatic appearance as the assistant to a murdered film studio executive in a two-part episode of NBC's "Law & Order". Garofalo made her first feature appearance in a bit role in "Late for Dinner" (1991) but began to garner more notice as Winona Ryder's roommate in the Stiller-directed "Reality Bites" (1994). In "Bye Bye, Love" (1995), she shone as the "blind date-from-hell" partnered with Randy Quaid. The following year, Garofalo displayed a sexy allure as a radio talk show host in "The Truth About Cats and Dogs", a modern spin on "Cyrano de Bergerac" wherein she recruits her neighbor (the swan-like Uma Thurman) to pretend to be her. Also in 1996, she offered a memorable cameo as a serving wench at a medieval-themed restaurant in "The Cable Guy", directed by Ben Stiller. She began to undertake more dramatic fare as a reporter in "Touch", a deputy in "Cop Land" and expanded on her "date-from-hell" persona in "Sweethearts" (all 1997). The busy actress nearly stole "Romy and Michele's High School Reunion" as a curmudgeonly classmate while "The Matchmaker" (both also 1997) afforded her the chance to display a playful side as a Bostonian who travels to Ireland and finds that she becomes the object of attraction to a number of residents. In 1998, she again teamed with Stiller, playing an agent interested in representing his drug-abusing screenwriter in "Permanent Midnight" and was a dogged FBI agent tracking a serial killer in "Clay Pigeons". Seeming to work constantly, Garofalo accepted supporting roles in several high-profile 1999 indies like "200 Cigarettes", "The Minus Man" (playing a co-worker who unwittingly romances a serial killer) and Kevin Smith's "Dogma" as well as studio productions like the comic book-inspired "The Mystery Men" as The Bowler. Garofolo's choices quickly grew less commercial, more adventurous--such as when played yippie Abbie Hoffman's wife Anita opposite Vincent D'Onofrio in "Steal This Movie" (2000)--or based on her personal and professional friendships, as when she starred opposite pal Ben Stiller's father Jerry in the offbeat comedy "The Independent" (2000). She had a cameo as Minnie Mogul in the not-as-funny-as-one-might-hope comedy "The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle" (2000) and nicely played a romantically challenged camp counselor fumbling into love with David Hyde Pierce in the uneven but sometimes hilarious retro summer camp comedy "Wet Hot American Summer" (2001) and starred opposite writer-director Mike Binder and Alan Rickman in Binder's Woody Allen-esque comedy "The Search for John Gissing" (2001). Next was a small supporting role in the serious "The Laramie Project" (2002), which depicted the effects of the real-life slaying of gay teen Matthew Shepard on his small hometown of Laramie, Wyoming; and a stint in the stellar comedic ensemble of director Barry Sonenfeld's otherwise dismal comedy "Big Trouble" (2002). Garofolo seemed content taking on smaller and smaller roles, and her turn in "Wonderland" (2003), a depiction of the real-life 1981 murders on Los Angeles' Wonderland Avenue involving porn legend John Holmes, was little more than a cameo, playing murder victim Joy Miller.
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