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13 Awkward Early Roles Of Iconic Comedians

Everyone’s gotta start somewhere.

13 Awkward Early Roles Of Iconic Comedians

December 25, 2021

Not everyone gets to start their on-screen comedy career on, say, SNL, and funny people’s pasts are littered with odd projects they’d rather we all forget. For example …

13

Patton Oswalt

COMEDY NERD Patton Oswalt starred in a profoundly unfunny show called Super Nerds. It was kind of supposed to be making fun of nerd culture, but it did that in such a hamfisted way, it comes off as a parody of a parody. CRACKED.COM — Source

12

David Letterman

COMEDY NERD David Letterman got fired from a job that he had on classical radio one time. Не was supposed to write bios for composers, but he just made fun of them - so they let him go for not respecting classical music, not too surprisingly. CRACKED.COM — Source

11

Mike Myers

COMEDY NERD Mike Myers' character from Wayne's World first appeared in Wayne's Power Minute. RATI It was a Mike Myers sketch featuring the same Wayne, on the short-lived Canadian show It's Only Rock'n'Roll, but it was waaaay more awkward and less funny than the movie. CRACKED.COM — Source

10

Stephen Colbert

COMEDY NERD Stephen Colbert was once, briefly, a host on Good Morning America. Apparently, they needed a funny guy for a particular segment one day in 1997, and they got Colbert - and he looked like he hated every second of it. CRACKED.COM — Source

9

Matthew Perry

COMEDY NERD Matthew Perry's first role was in 1988's A Night in the Life of Jimmy Reardon. And he comes off as adorable - he's baby-faced and looks like a sweet, earnest British schoolboy. CRACKED.COM — Source

8

Matt LeBlanc

COMEDY NERD Matt LeBlanc starred in a Heinz ketchup commercial way back in the 1980s. And it's kind of surreal to see him selling ketchup totally straight-faced after having seen him as a Friends star. CRACKED.COM — Source

7

Jennifer Aniston

COMEDY NERD Jennifer Aniston's very first on-screen role was as a kid in 1988's Mac and Me. She was a dancer in a fast food restaurant (and went completely uncredited). CRACKED.COM — Source

6

Zach Galifianakis

COMEDY NERD Zach Galifianakis got his start partly thanks to the MTV show Apt 2F. Не showed up on-screen uncharacteristically beardless, and the role got him some exposure, even though the show got cancelled pretty quickly. CRACKED.COM — Source

5

Tina Fey

COMEDY NERD Tina Fey did some of the voices for the pinball game Medieval Madness. APW She played a British noble lady who's on the older side, and the audio is even available on the internet. CRACKED.COM — Source

4

Simon Pegg

COMEDY NERD Simon Pegg once starred in the extremely cheap 1990s sitcom Asylum. GRABACH It was such a shoddy, amateur production, some of the actors even kept their names and basically played very slightly fictionalized versions of themselves. CRACKED.COM — Source

3

Kristen Wiig

COMEDY NERD Kristen Wiig played a fake psychologist on The Joe Schmo Show in 2003. The series' gimmick was simple: it was a fake reality show, but one of the people competing for a prize didn't know everyone else was an actor. CRACKED.COM — Source

2

Melissa McCarthy

COMEDY NERD In the 1998's God, Melissa McCarthy played a woman who talks to, uh, God. She talked to the Almighty on a cordless phone (the height of 1990s technology), and they apparently both enjoyed their long chats. CRACKED.COM — Source

1

Jerry Seinfeld

COMEDY NERD Jerry Seinfeld's first-ever TV role was as a joke writer on the show Benson. They fired him after three episodes, and after that he told himself he'd never give someone else control over his career. CRACKED.COM — Source

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