Lawyer-Turned-Comedian Lindsay Glazer Delivers Criminally Funny Stories
The Las Vegas-based comedian’s razor-sharp wit, humorous quips and captivating stage presence gives her a distinct edge.
Before taking the stage, Las Vegas-based comedian Lindsay Glazer listens in on the audience to gauge their energy levels. She watches how the crowd interacts with the host before she steps up to the mic. Glazer recalls sound advice that she received from a fellow comic in town, which has helped her cope with nerve-wracking minutes before a show.
"I assume that everyone before me, like the host and the guest, are all going to suck and that I'm going up to a completely cold audience."
Lindsay Glazer is a licensed lawyer-turned-comedian with a Masters degree in criminology. She can be seen on Comedy Central and heard on Sirius XM Radio. She has also performed at several comedy festivals as well as at Las Vegas comedy clubs like Wiseguys and L.A. Comedy Club. Her razor-sharp wit, humorous quips and captivating stage presence give her a distinct edge. As a former litigator and a classically trained opera singer, she thrives in the limelight.
"According to my sisters, I've been performing stand-up comedy since I was 10-years-old at the dinner table," says Lindsay Glazer over the phone. "I was a litigator, which is a performance skill. There was a study done that found the more laughs you get per minute on a jury, the more likely you are to win the case, even if it is a death penalty case. Isn't that wild?"
It’s hard for her to pinpoint how long she’s been performing stand-up, but if we’re talking in UK terms, she says that she’s already put in her 10,000 hours. The Las Vegas-based comedian is also a mother who enjoys taking her "sassy but brilliant" daughter, Daniella, to shows and sporting events around town. The pandemic brought her and her daughter to Las Vegas, although she’s been visiting Vegas with her dad since she was a kid.
"My dad's been taking me to Vegas since I was 5-years-old, when the Desert Inn still existed. He's always liked Vegas, and he used to play a lot of craps. Now he plays professional poker. I see my dad more now than I did when I lived in LA, even though he lives in Santa Barbara."
On her website, written in big, bold letters, is her trademarked tagline, "The Alpha B*tch," but she doesn’t think she’s actually a b*tch. It’s just a nod to her persona, reflecting her tongue-in-cheek humor, which a critic once described as "no bars held," meaning that she’s not afraid to speak her mind, even if people are likely to disagree.
"When I was practicing law, I did a lot of the same things that men did. I called it assertive; males called it being a b*tch," she says. "I have autism, and I talk about how that affects me. When I'm on stage, when I'm off stage, and the things I say Sometimes I get misunderstood because someone thinks I'm a b*tch when I'm just being direct."
How Glazer got into performing professional stand-up comedy is rather unconventional. She was attending a comedy festival where she hoped to perform, but that night they weren’t hosting an open mic. She was sitting beside stand-up comic Justin Foster, who opens for America Got Talent’s Drew Lynch. To her surprise, she ended up performing her first comedy act that night.
"I went up and did a set that I still have on tape. Surprisingly, I did very well, which does not happen to everyone. But it’s actually worse because I thought, ‘Awesome, I can do this,’" explains Glazer. "Then, like every comedian, I spent the next six months bombing because that's what every comic does when they start out. No one just gets up there and is amazing right away. You have to keep doing it."
No comedian is safe from hecklers. There seems to always be that one person who interrupts a set. Many times the ones who interrupt the show actually think they are helping it. The heckling, according to Glazer, is considerably worse for female comedians.
"For women, it's even worse because I can make a joke on stage about being a dominatrix. And then suddenly, everyone assumes offstage that I'm a dominatrix. A long time ago at a bar show in Tampa—of course, it was in Tampa—some guy yelled, ‘I'd like to take you off stage, tie you up, and put tape over your mouth.' I said, ‘Okay, are you trying to have sex with me or kidnap me in this scenario?' I say whatever comes to mind to match their level of bizarreness."
Although Glazer is in favor of an all-female comedy lineup, she has mixed views about how it is promoted. Given that, viewers are not often pitched on their male counterparts in the same way.
"I understand that females don't get as many spaces to perform in as often. So I get why people advertise that way. I think having all female lineups is fantastic, but I also don't think we should advertise them as all female lineups. That's like saying, 'We're feminists, and we're equal to men, but we also need a special show.'"
One of the strangest things about performing comedy while on the road is that sometimes comics share lodging together. This is a common practice among comedy clubs that own a condo. While she was appearing at the Absolute Comedy Club in Toronto, Glazer stayed with a fellow comic she didn’t know, which sparked a comical circumstance.
"I've never ever lived with anyone who I wasn't sleeping with, you know, since I lived in my parents house. So I stayed in a condo with a very nice comedian. But I got nervous that my electric toothbrush was too loud because I'm a crazy person. I literally opened the door and yelled, ‘That's my electric toothbrush, not my vibrator. Don't worry!’ Of course, that just sounds more suspicious."
Lindsay Glazer’s new comedy album, Thanks, Dad, was released nationwide on Friday, April 14. The album explores her life on the road, life in Las Vegas, and unique relationship with her father as well as her experiences as a mother herself. Thanks, Dad was produced by the world’s largest comedy production and distribution company, Comedy Dynamics. To keep up with her forthcoming shows, follow her on Instagram.