AND THE TRUTH SHALL SET YOU FREE! weekly inside the world’s most famous comedy club, The Liar’s Club is a podcast where hosts Felicia Michaels, Jess Wellington, and David C. Smalley sits down with some of your favorite comedians to play a fun-fact mystery game where they attempt and find the LIE in their hilarious stories.
Filmed inside of The Comedy Store in Hollywood, CA, this week comedian Erik Griffin joins the group to share two stories regarding life in comedy. One of stories is completely factual, while the other is a huge lie.
Erik Griffin: Erik Griffin is a stand-up comedian, writer, and actor best known for playing Montez Walker on Comedy Central’s Workaholics. Griffin’s mother enrolled him in a stand-up comedy class at UCLA Extension when he expressed interest in becoming a comedian. The class was taught by the late Sandi C. Shore, daughter of The Comedy Store founders Sammy Shore and Mitzi Shore, and at the end, allowed students to perform in a showcase at The Comedy Store. He recorded a half-hour special for Comedy Central in 2013. Later that year, he released his first stand-up album, Technical Foul: Volume One. Erik can be heard weekly on his highly-regarded podcast entitled Riffin w/ Griffin.
Felicia Michaels: Michaels was born in Kansas and grew up in Fountain Head, Colorado. She began working as a comedian aged 18. During the 1990s, she shifted her stand-up persona from a dumb-blonde stereotype to a soft-spoken provocateur with an unrepentantly blue sense of humor.She explores such topics as the dynamics of the male/female relationship, “dirty thoughts,” and the proliferation of the sensual feminist. She has appeared in three movies: Smart Alex, directed by Steve Oedekerk; Los Enchiladas, directed by Mitch Hedberg; and, most recently, I Am Comic, directed by Jordan Brady. She was a regular on the TV show Parental Discretion. She posed nude for Playboy and was featured in the October 1992 issue. She is also a photographer, and her 2008 photography project, titled “Stand Up / Stripped Down”, documents comedians and the mystery of what happens backstage in the shadows that lead from the green room to the power of the stage. “Stand Up / Stripped Down” received first place for the people’s choice at the 2008 edition of The Prix de la Photographie, Paris, for photojournalism. She is also a recipient of a CINE Golden Eagle Award for In The Weeds, a short film she wrote and directed. Michaels was the co-host of a popular weekly podcast with Joey Diaz named Beauty and Da Beast. It was nominated for Funniest Podcast by the Podcast awards in 2012. In 2011, she released her second CD, entitled Chew On This, which continues where Lewd Awakenings left off.
Jess Welington: Jessica is originally from North Carolina but started comedy at the Sacramento Comedy Spot after serving 6 years in the Air Force. She then moved to Los Angeles where she opens for Iliza Shlesinger and works at the World Famous Comedy Store. She was the first female to be hired as a “door guy” at the Comedy Store, a prestigious job that comes with a developmental slot at the club. There she has shared the stage with the likes of Joe Rogan, Ron White, Chris D’Elia, Ali Wong and many more.
David Smalley: David C. Smalley, known as “Reggie” on Nickelodeon’s Danger Force, is a touring Stand Up Comedian & actor based in Los Angeles. Sometimes he breaks into homes. For money. On camera. Ok, he was also in several national commercials for Ring as a burglar. He’s a bad guy, but the funny kind. Being born & raised in Texas didn’t quite make him a redneck; but he has just enough southern charm & college education to connect with audiences across the world. For more than 11 years, he’s hosted the David C. Smalley podcast, with over 50 Million downloads, where he skeptically and respectfully confronts world views and beliefs he disagrees with.
Respectfully should have an asterisk.
In his stand up, David confronts topics like racism, women’s rights, and LGBTQ struggles, because everyone always wants to know what straight white men think about these issues.
The Comedy Store: The greatest stand-up comedy club in the world. The Store was founded April 7, 1972, on the Sunset Strip in West Hollywood by comedian Sammy Shore, his wife Mitzi and comedy writer Rudy DeLuca. It started because Sammy needed a place to work out when he wasn’t on the road. Sammy was the longtime opening act for Elvis Pressley. It was the first all stand-up comedy nightclub in the world. In the beginning, since Sammy was frequently on the road, his wife, Mitzi assumed the nightly operations of the club and selected and scheduled the comedians that performed there.
