STAND-UP COMEDY Our Encore series explores the connection between food and the performing arts. In honor of National Tell A Joke Day (August 16), we’re sharing how food has played a role in the life of famous comedian, Phyllis (Driver) Diller. Comedienne Phyllis Driver, better known by her stage name of Phyllis Diller, took the stage in a time 11 | Add a Little Spice
where female comics were a rarity. Best known for her eccentric stage persona, her self-deprecating humor, her wild hair and clothes, and her exaggerated, cackling laugh, Diller was a groundbreaking standup comic – one of the first female comics to become a household name in the U.S. She paved the way for Joan Rivers, Roseanne Barr, and Ellen DeGeneres, among others, who credit her influence. With the encouragement of her husband, Diller made her debut as a stand-up comedian in 1955 at age 37 in the basement of the San Francisco
