I had a rough week. An angry mob of fire ants decided that I looked good enough for dinner, and thus I was sent to the emergency room. My already busy week now includes doctor visits, medications, and the mother load of all itchiness. Needless to say, I almost canceled my interview with comedic actress, Lauren Pritchard. Talking comedy was the last thing I wanted to do, but bandaged and bruised, I arrived at the small Toluca Lake hot spot that Ms. Pritchard suggested. When she saw me walk in with my exaggerated limp, she smiled warmly and instantly ordered a margarita for me. I immediately liked her style.

After explaining my appearance and predicament to her, she looked at me and said, “It’s so hard to love it when bad things happen, but it often prepares us for something great.” Pritchard’s genuine burst of wisdom comes from her own journey that lead her to join the cast of FOX’s Mad TV. She started her improv career at age 14 in Orlando, FL at SAK Theatre, and has studied under some of the best and most respected comedians in the business, including Wayne Brady and Joel McHale. She has performed with TheatreSports, ACME, iO West, and ComedySportz, and has had several television appearances.

It wasn’t Pritchard’s lengthy resume that caught the eye of Mad TV producers: it was a “funny, yet tragic” blog she wrote when rats invaded her apartment building, causing an outbreak of mites. She had an allergic reaction to the mites and spent a week quarantined in the hospital. Left living in a hotel with mite bites, little money, and “nothing left to lose,” Pritchard found herself auditioning seven times for Fox executives before finally snagging her role on Mad TV. In order to introduce her to a whole new audience, she was featured on the comedy site Funny or Die. She went on to film fourteen episodes of Mad TV before Fox canceled the show. The end of Mad TV has become yet another new beginning for Pritchard: she has a recurring role on HBO’s mega-hit True Blood, playing “Coralee” the town gossip.  Pritchard improvised the fan favorite line “I’d wear him like a scrunchie” on True Blood’s season 2 finale.  Next she will be the featured celebrity on an episode of Disney’s original hit series, The Imagination Movers. As for me, Lauren’s story about how good things could come from a bug attack after my own recent experience with the ants came as a much needed antidote to my insect-induced suffering.

Posted by Josh on September 12, 2009 @ 9:42 PM