Gives Good Headline

If you’re a fan of the comedy news format -- The Daily Show, The Colbert Report -- you have Lizz Winstead to thank, in part. The writer, producer, and comedian was co-creator of The Daily Show, co-hosted “Unfiltered” on Air America, and now has her own online show, “Shoot The Messenger” (www.shootthemessengernyc.com), which includes a dead-on parody of morning “news” programs. Fiercely political, Winstead’s stand-up act wrings out the headlines and rouses liberal bugbears like healthcare, the pharmaceutical industry, and religion. “The new American dream,” she proposes, for instance: “If someone were to invent a couch that flushed.” She guarantees that audiences will get the latest breaking news in her shows. “That’s what’s fun,” she recently told Westword's "The Latest Word" blog. “It’s kind of like getting a jumpstart on SNL. It’s like, ‘We’re going to be able to laugh and have some catharsis before anybody else.’”
Thu., Oct. 23, 8 p.m., 2008