Tammy Pescatelli

Also known as: Tammy, Pescatelli

Tammy Pescatelli was born Tammy Gillespie on May 15, 1969, in Perry, Ohio, a small town outside Cleveland. Raised in a large Italian-American family, the big, loud, opinionated family dynamic would become the bedrock of her comedy material for decades. From 1990 to 1995, she worked in the Quad Cities area as a morning radio show co-host, TV spokeswoman, and basketball cheerleader -- early media experience that gave her comfort in front of cameras before she fully committed to stand-up. Pescatelli's comedic career took off in 2004 when she appeared on NBC's Last Comic Standing Season 2, making it to the final six contestants. Her season played out to more than 17 million viewers, exposing her sharp observational humor to a massive national audience. The Last Comic Standing platform gave her the momentum to become a headliner at clubs across the country and led to appearances on multiple television shows including FOX's Laughs, NBC's America's Got Talent, The Wendy Williams Show, and Gotham Comedy Live. In 2010, Pescatelli won Comedy Central's Stand-Up Showdown, further validating her place in the comedy hierarchy. In 2011, she co-created, executive produced, wrote, and starred in A Stand Up Mother, a reality series on WEtv that documented her life balancing motherhood, marriage, and a comedy career. The show followed Tammy, her husband Luca Palanca (a retired law enforcement officer), and their young son as they moved from Hollywood to Meadville, Pennsylvania. That same year, 2011, Pescatelli was diagnosed with stage 2 ovarian cancer. She underwent surgery and was told she w

Profile updated 2026-09-26.

All Dabbleverse people · Current rankings · Latest news · Live dashboard