John Mulrooney

John Mulrooney is an American comedian, radio and TV show host, actor and writer.

Mulrooney was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. He began his career on the NYC comedy scene at Rick Newman's Catch a Rising Star in 1979. Mulrooney transitioned into television in the early eighties on a show called Comedy Tonight. In addition to his 13 stand-up appearances he also wrote and produced original content for 165 episodes. Mulrooney competed on Star Search and lost, but it helped his early career, since he was hired to work for the program, writing comedy and doing audience warm up. Upon relocating to Los Angeles, California, Mulrooney became a "regular" at The Improvisation, The World Famous Comedy Store and The Laugh Factory.

After Joan Rivers left as host of The Late Show on the Fox network in 1987, Mulrooney was asked to replace her. After a few months, The Late Show was cancelled due to low ratings and strong competition from The Tonight Show and Nightline. Mulrooney hosted Comic Strip: Live, first for a year as a local show on KTTV in Los Angeles in 1988, continuing when Fox TV programming executives expanded the show to Fox-owned stations, then network-wide on Saturday nights, for an additional year. He continued to appear on other TV shows such as An Evening at the Improv, Hollywood Squares, Showtime, HBO and Comedy Central and filling in as guest host for Pat Sajak on The Pat Sajak Show.

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