THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, October 7, 1994 TAG: 9410050146
SECTION: PORTSMOUTH CURRENTS PAGE: 06 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JUDY PARKER, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 110 lines
Jan Bartlett says she's just affirming what her in-laws have known for years - she's nuts.
That's probably an unfair self-analysis. After just two minutes of conversation with Bartlett, it's fair to say that retiring, reserved and restrained are not words that appropriately describe her personality.
``If I was the demure Southern lady my parents raised me to be, I ought to be graduating from the Junior League and joining the local women's club at this point in my life.
``But no-o-o-o. I'm a fortysomething, full-figured female, living in la la land, 3,000 miles away from my family.
``I've got the world's greatest husband, two college degrees and four grown children. I've had a great job as a medical technologist, and I've been a successful TV news anchor. So what do I do to make a living? I tell jokes . .
For the past year, Bartlett, nee Janice Bond, Western Branch High School class of 1970, has been living her lifelong fantasy to be a stand-up comic, and since arriving in Los Angeles last fall, she's been a regular at Hollywood's Laugh Factory and the L.A. Cabaret.
Could Bartlett be the comedy kingdom's next lady-in-waiting? So far, her comedic career has been orbiting in some sort of parallel universe akin to the successes of Roseanne, Ellen Degeneres and Fran Drescher, one-time stand-up comics who've successfully segued their talents into popular television sitcoms.
``I've always wanted to do comedy,'' Bartlett said recently during a telephone interview from her Los Angeles home. ``I know that sounds hokey, but it's the truth.''
Bartlett's admission was voiced in a barely audible whisper, as though she's just beginning to feel comfortable with her ability to make people laugh.
``After I got the last kid in college. . . the one with the pierced tongue who clacks when she eats . . . boy, has that changed the mood at the dinner table . . . anyway, I'd just turned 40, and I realized that before long I'd be a very unhappy 90-year-old regretting that I never had tried to be a professional comic.
``Six weeks after I got to California, I landed my first gig at the Laugh Factory. I don't think I'll have any regrets in my old age.''
From the time she was growing up in Westhaven, to the day she was voted wittiest in her high school graduating class, to the hours she spent working the graveyard shift as a lab technician at Portsmouth General, passing `no-work-to-be-done' hours getting laughs from the hospital's emergency room staff, Bartlett said she's been honing her comedy skills.
``OK, I admit I made it difficult for my teachers to conduct class,'' Bartlett said, with no hint of apology in her voice. ``But finally, I'm not getting yelled at for making people laugh . . . I'm actually getting paid to do it.''
Bartlett's circuitous route from Portsmouth to comedy clubs in Los Angeles has come via stops in Alaska and Charlottesville.
After moving from Portsmouth to Fairbanks in 1985 in a job change for her husband, Richard, also a Portsmouth native, with the couple's four children, Bartlett graduated from the University of Alaska with a degree in broadcast journalism, and landed a job as evening news anchor for CBS affiliate KTVF-TV.
``I was a closet comedian, and it was a real fluke how I finally got on stage. I was asked to be a celebrity host for a roast at a local comedy club in Fairbanks, and when I heard the audience laughing at my routine, I was hooked.''
Moving from Alaska to Charlottesville in 1989, Bartlett took another news job, but spent her spare time performing ``anywhere I could get a gig. I spent nearly every weekend commuting to comedy clubs in New York, D.C., Richmond, Virginia Beach. It was a blast, but my agent kept saying if I was really serious, I had to go to California.''
Although she's been flying a cross-country shuffle every couple of months between Los Angeles and Charlottesville during the past year to visit her family, (for the time being, Richard's job as a systems analyst at Crystal City in Alexandria precludes his move to the West Coast, Bartlett explained) her long-distance commuting is paying off.
She's had several guest spots on the Lifetime Channel's ``Girls Night Out,'' and a featured appearance last season on NBC's ``L.A. Law.''
``I just finished a pilot for a sitcom,'' Bartlett said. ``If it sells, it could be ready as a summer replacement next year.''
The show, ``To Pay the Rent,'' has Bartlett playing, what else, a stand-up comic, who inherits a dilapidated Hollywood mansion.
``I can't sell it, and I can't afford to fix it up, so I decide to take in boarders, including a 12-year-old who does all the talking for his mom because she's a mime, and a guy who's a maintenance man by day and a drag queen by night.''
Bartlett also has copped minor roles in four feature-length films, including ``Boys on the Side,'' starring Whoopie Goldberg.
``I'm hoping my scene doesn't end up on the cutting room floor. Of course, my part is so small, if anybody blinks or sneezes while I'm on screen, they'll miss me.''
So, how long does Bartlett plan to give comedy a go?
``Well, I'm hoping it won't take me 10 years to become an overnight success,'' she said. ``But things are going great. I got my first standing ovation last week, and anybody who knows me wouldn't believe I was lost for words.
``All I could do was shuffle my feet and blow kisses to the audience.''
And how does she handle stage fright?
``The only time I can't eat is when I'm getting ready for a performance, because I'm so nervous, and I'm usually doing a pee-pee dance backstage before I'm introduced . . . but after I hear that first laugh from the audience, and hey, I'm on a roll.'' ILLUSTRATION: Jan Bartlett: ``I'm a fortysomething, full-figured female,
living in la la land.''
KEYWORDS: INTERVIEW PROFILE by CNB