Uncategorically Comic

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By Newsweek Editors

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JANEANE GAROFALO is perfectly upfront about her shortcomings, and in many categories. On pets: "I don't know what the truth about cats and dogs really is." On interviews: "I don't think anyone gives a s- about my opinions." On her movies: "I don't go." She's being forced to attend the premire of "The Truth About Cats and Dogs--"but she has a plan. "I will make an appearance and then bolt. Go smoke some cigarettes in the bathroom, I don't care. But not watch the movie, because I cannot--I cannot watch my image on a movie screen."

But audiences are drawn to precisely that sass and self-deprecation. Garofalo, 31, who grew up in Madison, N.J., graduated from Providence College determined to become a stand-up comic. In 1993, she landed on HBO's "The Larry Sanders Show" as the wisecracking talent booker, but won even more fans as the sardonic Gap salesgirl in the 1994 movie "Reality Bites." She made no secret of how much she hated working on "Saturday Night Live" last season, finally quitting because she found it unbearably sexist. Though she shuns the labels often imposed on her--"Gen X," "alternative"--she's "definitely feminist." She admits to "the body-shame feelingthat you don't measure up to someone like [costar] Uma [Thurman] ... I have f-ed-up eating rules, I have weird rules about running. It's terrible, and when I lose weight I'm not proud of it, 'cause I don't do it for me."

Though she's in two upcoming movies--this summer's "Larger Than Life" with Bill Murray and "Romy and Michelle," now filming with Mira Sorvino--what she really wants is for people to check out her stand-up act in New York or L.A. "It's my own material," she says. "I do it the way I want to, when I want to." That's her favorite category.

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