Suzanne Westenhoefer – “Nothing In My Closet But My Clothes”

Raised in The Pennsylvania Amish country, Suzanne always loved being the center of attention, so she naturally gravitated to acting in school. After graduating from college, with a BFA, like so many aspiring actors, she moved to New York City and became a bartender. Finally, she was dared to enter a comedy contest at a popular cabaret in the West Village and won first prize. From then on, she was hooked on comedy and everyone who saw her was hooked on her.

Suzanne then began doing stand-up as one of the first openly gay comedians performing gay comedy to straight audiences in mainstream comedy clubs. In 1991, Suzanne appeared on a groundbreaking episode of the Sally Jesse Raphael show called, “Breaking the Lesbian Stereotype…Lesbians Who Don’t Look Like Lesbians”. Says, Suzanne, “In the 12 years since that showed aired, I still get mail from people who tell me how that show changed their lives. It changed mine too.”

In 1991 and 1992, her stand-up comedy appeared on Comedy Central’s Short Attention Span Theater and Stand-up Stand-up. She went on to become the first openly gay comic to host her own HBO Comedy Special in 1994 (which earned her a Cable Ace Award nomination) and to appear on the Late Show with David Letterman in 2003. In 2004 she was featured in the film Laughing Matters along with Kate Clinton, Marga Gomez and Karen Williams. In 2006 she starred as a panelist on GSN’s remake of I’ve Got a Secret, which featured a panel of gay celebrities who had to guess the various guests’ ‘secrets’ through a series of timed questions. Her comedy special and documentary, A Bottom on Top, aired on LOGO Television in the fall of 2007.

What words best describe Comedian Suzanne Westenhoefer? How about bold, bawdy, and just … Suzanne!