Iliza Shlesinger

Iliza Vie Shlesinger (/əˈlaɪzə ˈʃlɛsɪŋɡər/; born February 22, 1983) is an American comedian who was the 2008 winner of NBC's Last Comic Standing and went on to host the syndicated dating show Excused and the TBS comedy/game show Separation Anxiety. In 2017, she briefly hosted her own late-night talk show called Truth & Iliza on Freeform.

Shlesinger was born in Dallas,Texas, and was raised in Dallas, Texas. Her family is Jewish. She attended the private Greenhill School and participated in the school's improvisation team. She studied Spanish and Mandarin Chinese while in school. She performed with ComedySportz Dallas and attended the University of Kansas for her freshman year. She also participated in Semester at Sea. She transferred to Emerson College in Boston, where she majored in film, refined her writing and editing skills, and became a member of one of the campus's comedy sketch groups, Jimmy's Traveling All Stars.

After graduating from college, Shlesinger moved to Los Angeles to pursue stand-up comedy. She was one of the most popular members of the Whiteboy Comedy group of standup comedians in Los Angeles, which brought her to the stage at The Improv in Hollywood.

In 2007, Shlesinger won Myspace's So You Think You're Funny contest and has been featured as the G4 network's Myspace Girl of the Week. Her television credits include E! Network's Forbes Celebrity 100, TV Guide's America's Next Top Producer, Comedy Central Presents Season 14 Episode 18, John Oliver's New York Stand Up Show, Byron Allen's Comics Unleashed, and History Channel's History of a Joke. She has written for Heavy.com and had her own show on GOTV's mobile network.

In 2008, Shlesinger became the first woman, and the youngest, winner of NBC's Last Comic Standing, in the series' sixth season. She was twice selected by other comedians, to compete in the head-to-head eliminations, winning each time. She appeared in The Last Comic Standing Tour.

Shlesinger worked with Lewis Black to contribute to Surviving the Holidays, a History Channel holiday special, and narrated the 2009 documentary Imagine It!² The Power of Imagination. In 2010, she released an on-demand comedy video, Man Up and Act Like a Lady, and an on-demand comedy album, iliza LIVE, on her website, via The ConneXtion. Around the time of these releases, Shlesinger appeared in a business comedy video series for Slate.

Shlesinger hosted The Weakly News on TheStream.tv from July 7, 2007 to April 9, 2012. She also hosted Excused, a syndicated American reality-based dating competition series, which ran from 2011 to 2013. She co-stars in the 2013 film Paradise. She began a podcast called Truth and Iliza in August 2014. Featuring celebrity guests & personal friends, the semi-weekly podcast is a forum for discussing matters which bother her and those on the show, with punk theme song performed by Being Mean to Pixley.

Shlesinger was comic co-host of StarTalk Radio Show with Neil DeGrasse Tyson for season 7, episode 12 titled Cosmic Queries: Galactic Grab Bag, post date: 20 May 2016.

On July 13, 2016, the ABCdigital original short-form digital comedy series Forever 31, created by and starring Shlesinger was released.

A late night show for Iliza Shlesinger was placed into development in September 2016 for the cable channel Freeform.Truth & Iliza began airing on May 2, 2017.

On November 7, 2017, Weinstein Books published Shlesinger's book Girl Logic: The Genius and the Absurdity with an introduction by Mayim Bialik.

In December 2017, it was reported the comedian was sued by a man who was denied admission to one of her girls-only shows. The initial complaint was dismissed and then refiled as a class action suit.

Netflix

Shlesinger's first comedy album and video, War Paint, was recorded on December 1, 2012 at The Lakewood Theater in Dallas, Texas, and released on Netflix on September 1, 2013. Her second stand-up special, Freezing Hot, was recorded in Denver, Colorado and premiered on Netflix in January 23, 2015. Her third Netflix stand-up special, titled Confirmed Kills, was recorded at The Vic Theatre in Chicago, Illinois, and premiered on Netflix on September 23, 2016. Her fourth Netflix stand-up special, Elder Millennial, was recorded aboard USS Hornet, at the USS Hornet Sea, Air & Space Museum in Alameda, California on February 23, 2018, and premiered on Netflix on July 24, 2018. Her fifth Netflix stand-up special, Unveiled was recorded in Nashville and premiered on Netflix on Nov 19, 2019. Iliza Shlesinger also stars in the May 2020 Netflix Film Spenser Confidential.

On May 12, 2018, Shlesinger married chef Noah Galuten. She frequently discusses her love of ornithology in her Netflix and comedy specials.

Comedy specials

Film