**Melanie Hutsell**Bio

Thyroid Cancer at the same time. Funny? Not so much, but it was a story she thought was worth telling. Originally, Melanie developed Disco Fever as a one-woman-show called, “Party Mom!” under the direction of Six Feet Under writer and long time friend, Jill Soloway.

Melanie has been a writer and performer in such sketch shows as For Entertainment Purposes Only which she produced with Jackie Beat, Character Assassination, Margot’s Bush and many others. She has also written and performed monologues in the long running, Sit-n-Spin.

Melanie moved from Maryville, Tennessee to Chicago in winter of 1989. There she studied improv at Second City, where her first teacher was the brilliant, Mick Napier. Shortly after graduating from Second City, Mick invited her to help create a theatre. She became one of the many co-founding members of the still up and running, Annoyance Theatre. It was a very exciting time as they used their improv skills to create such underground, off the wall, musicals making fun of musicals as, “That Darned Anti-Christ!”, “Coed Prison Sluts” and “Tippi! A Portrait of a Virgin- An After School Special Gone Bad”. When Jill and Faith Soloway came on to the scene, they produced both, The Real Live Brady Bunch and The Miss Vagina Pageant, which they also created through improv. It was The Miss Vagina Pageant that really caught the eye of Saturday Night Live talent scouts. Melanie auditioned for SNL and was hired for three seasons.

Melanie was just 23-years-old when she hit Saturday Night Live, where she wrote and performed the characters, Jan Brady, the maniacal but loveable Tridelt and Tori Spelling. Since moving to LA in 1994, she married, had two children and has continued to have the same passion for comedy as she did when she started 20 years ago.

Please check back to this site often, as Melanie will be adding new stuff every week.

A few years back, Melanie completed screenwriting courses at both Writers Boot Camp and Cinestory. She is currently working with new writing partner, Mr. Sam Pancake, on what will be her third screenplay. On the comedy end, Melanie really thought she was done with impersonations, but then along came Food Network’s, Queen of Southern Cooking, Miss Paula Deen! And well, she couldn’t resist. She was lucky enough to get to go on Paula’s Best Dishes and surprise her with the impersonation and they had a blast!

Melanie just got her story, Disco Fever, published in Dani Klein Modisett’s , “Afterbirth… Stories You Won’t Read In Parenting Magazines.” Here, she tells her story of having her first child and getting