Back Stage West recently spoke to actress/comedian Janeane Garofalo, star of the upcoming romantic comedy THE MATCHMAKER, in which she plays the reluctant target of an annual matchmaking event in a small Irish town.

Her screen credits include COP LAND, THE TRUTH ABOUT CATS AND DOGS, ROMY AND MICHELE'S HIGH SCHOOL REUNION, REALITY BITES, LARGER THAN LIFE, TOUCH, and THE CABLE GUY. She can next be seen in CLAY PIGEONS opposite Vince Vaughn and Joaquin Phoenix, ALMOST ROMANTIC with Jon Stewart, and PERMANENT MIDNIGHT with Ben Stiller and Elizabeth Hurley.

Garofalo was recently nominated for an Emmy award for her supporting role on HBO's THE LARRY SANDERS SHOW. Her other TV credits include THE BEN STILLER SHOW, SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE, and appearances on SEINFELD, ELLEN, HOME IMPROVEMENT, and DR. KATZ. She created and hosted her own comedy/sketch show COMEDY PRODUCT for Comedy Central in 1995, appeared in her own HBO special, and co-hosted, with pal Ben Stiller, the 1996 MTV Movie Awards.

Her acerbic wit and grungy dress code, as witnessed at the recent Emmy awards, have made Garofalo a hero to many young adults. While she resists the role of spokesperson, she has emerged as one of the stronger comic voices of her generationóand perhaps its most representative leading actress.

BACK STAGE WEST: How did you get started in your career?

Janeane Garofalo: I started doing standup in 1985 in Boston, then I went to Houston, and then Los Angeles. Around '89, I met Ben Stiller and that's how I got into acting-at his urging. Without that break of meeting Ben, I don't know what would have happened. I never meant to be an actor. What I wanted was to be as famous as Dennis Miller or to get on SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE--that's every standup's dream.

BSW: Were your early years as a standup lean times for you?

Janeane: I had day jobs like anyone does. When you're in your early 20s, it's kind of fun to have shitty jobs and you meet people in your same boat. I waitressed, I sold shoes, I worked in a movie theatre, I temped-all the usual. I have fond memories of all that, but when I was trying to seek out a living on the road as a standup through the National College Association, those were very dark days-lonely, depressing, poor. I was on the road alone, doing shit gigs. Things didn't turn around until I was 27 and I did THE BEN STILLER SHOW and THE LARRY SANDERS SHOW.

BSW: Did you take any steps to make the move from comedian to actress-like, say, study acting?

Janeane: Ben made me take four classes before REALITY BITES [which he directed] and I loathed every second of it. I do not believe in acting classes. I think they tamper with instincts, homogenize you, and introduce you to really lost people. I mean, some of those people in acting class were nuts.

BSW: What challenges did you find when making the transition from standup to acting?

Janeane: I was a complete novice-I mean, not even having been on a movie set to visit anyone. So it was good to start in TV and learn things the hard way. I didn't know some of the technical things, like where you stand, or that you do scenes 50 times from different angles. I just didn't know what was expected.

BSW: Is there anything you wish someone had told you when you were starting out in acting?

Janeane: Keep your mouth shut-definitely. I had to learn that the hard way. Honesty is not the best policy on a set. If you don't like the product or the person you're working with, keep it to yourself.

BSW: Are you confident about your craft as an actor now?

Janeane: No, I feel lucky. I think I'm definitely a competent actor. I know my lines and hit my mark now and look natural, for the most part, but I've never been challenged. I have not been asked to do something that is very hard, like play Joan of Arc or Dorothy Parker. To do a part like that--who knows if I could?

BSW: Is getting lead roles important to you?

Janeane: Lead is great, but supporting is fine with me, because none of the responsibility of the movie's criticism is on your shoulders. You're not responsible if the movie tanks and you just had a really short, sweet time. You're in and out like Desert Storm.

I've only had a principal role in three films, and it really affects the flow of your life. My life fell apart for about four months at a stretch. You can't take care of business, and I don't have an assistant, so it's not like I can delegate duties. You really can't do what you need to do--like errands. You're stuck; you need to be on the set from about 5:30 in the morning until anywhere between six at night to midnight. Sometimes you're working all night, so it's dusk-till-dawn shooting. After it's over, your life really falls apart; you feel sicky weird. Your clock is messed up and you sleep during the day.

BSW: Is it important for you to continue doing standup?

Janeane: It's very important to me. Acting is not particularly fulfilling unless you're in theatre, which I haven't done. The business of making a movie is not fulfilling; it's kind of boring. You work on the same five lines all day from different angles, and you do it in segments, out of sequence. So it's not like you're in a flow, whereas people who do plays and theatre talk about how fulfilling that is on a nightly basis, and you grow and you get to really learn what you're doing.

BSW: What don't you like about the entertainment business?

Janeane: Bad reviews. Invasion of privacy. The rejection. The tedium of movie-making. But mostly negotiating with assholes, which is probably the same as any business in the world; it's just that these people are allowed to be assholes and coddled for it. Whereas probably in any other business, people would say, "You're an asshole. You're fired," here, it's, "That guy's an asshole, but he better get what he wants."

BSW: You seem to have become a kind of spokesperson for a certain Gen-X demographic. Do you find it bizarre that you have been elevated to this status?

Janeane: It's weird. I've heard that, but it sounds like a joke to me. I don't feel like a spokesperson at all. I think people are misreading my generation. I'm not Gen-X. I am going to be 33 next week. I think people have the perception that I am younger than that, maybe because of the way I dress or because I deal so much in pop culture and I'm MTV-oriented.

BSW: You chose to dress extremely casually at the recent Emmy Awards. Why did you decide to not get all dolled up?

Janeane: I was delightfully under-dressed, and believe me, people commented on that. I didn't do my hair. I couldn't possibly wear a gown. I feel badly about my body sometimes, which most women do. That's regardless of this career. So granted, I didn't wear a gown, because I don't wear gowns; also, there's not one that was going to look good on me--not with these upper arms and gut. That would have been begging for Joan Rivers to come down on my ass so hard. I would rather have her come down on me for the way I was dressed than for my fat. I'm not built like Christine Lahti, Gillian Anderson, or Demi Moore. If I was in the gym 18 hours a day, maybe I could be, but I don't live my life that way.

BSW: Where do you see yourself in the future?

Janeane: I would like to have a talk radio show. I'd like to tackle some more difficult dramatic parts. I'd like to work with Albert Brooks. I'd like to work with Bill Murray again. I'd like to work with Catherine O'Hara and Andrea Martin and Tracey Ullman and Bonnie Hunt. That's it.

BSW: Last question. What advice do you have for struggling actors and comedians out there?

Janeane: Stay away from the fen-phen.