7 Quick Questions for Lisa Ann Walter

Speaking of smarts, congratulations on winning last year’s Celebrity Jeopardy! tournament. I read that you and your mom used to watch the show together. Was that good practice?

[My mom] loved reading, learning [and] discovering new things. We would listen to talk radio in the car, and she would start explaining what it was they were talking about and what it referenced in history, and what I should know about that subject. I was paying rapt attention — it all sounded like a story to me — and I think learning to love these little tidbits and trivia, for whatever reason, I just held on to it. We used to watch old movies together. She grew up in New York in the ’50s. She saw all the Broadway shows and went to all the movies. … I learned a lot just listening to her. As she got older, Jeopardy! was the show that was challenging for her. … She was sharp as a tack. She knew most of the answers.

Who inspired your show business pursuits?

My father was a singer. He was training at Carnegie Hall and he was very good. He sang my whole life. That’s what inspired me — he was doing shows. He taught me piano and I learned harmonizing and singing and really humor from my dad. He was the one that let me stay up late to watch [Rowan & Martin’s] Laugh-In and The Smothers Brothers [Comedy Hour] and [The] Carol Burnett [Show]. … There weren’t very many female comics on TV back then … so watching Laugh-In made me think, Oh, you could be a funny woman and do this for a living.

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You’re still working as a stand-up comedian. When did you realize you were funny?

Very early. I was a chubby kid when I was little. I got teased mercilessly. And so I learned to make the joke first to be liked and to not be hurt. When I really knew that I could do [comedy] was — I had the George Carlin [comedy] albums, I had the Richard Pryor albums. I don’t think my mother knew what was on those albums, but I knew all of Richard Pryor’s routines. My parents had just divorced. My dad had left [and] my mom was heartbroken. She was in a really bad place. And I told a dirty joke — and my mother’s a Catholic lady, I never heard her curse. She laughed when I told a joke with a curse word in it. And I thought, Oh, I’ve got license. If I can make [people] laugh, I can get away with anything. And that’s what I learned: You can be dirty as long as you’re funny.

Do you ever get anxious about performing?

I always get scared right before I go on stage, and sometimes even before I start a scene on Abbott. [The show] is like being in a repertory company with the same people week after week, and then we have guest stars. So it’s very much like theater, which is what I did first before I ever did stand-up.

How do you keep up your energy level as a comedian as well as during your busy Abbott filming schedule?

I love what I do, so that makes it easy. … But energy wise, I don’t drink. And, at least right now, I am trying to eat correctly. I eat a lot of vegetables and good food. I don’t take a lot of medication. I’m lucky in that way, that I really only take one little blood pressure pill, and that’s it.