A staple on the comedy scene for over a decade, comedian Kira Soltanovich has worked in the entertainment world as a writer, actor and producer. Currently she can be seen in Disney’s new show “Prankstars” and as the voice of The Phony Photo Booth, on “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.” A joke writer for comedy legend Joan Rivers, Soltanovich was a Series Regular for four seasons on the Oxygen and nationally syndicated show, “Girls Behaving Badly.” She has also appeared as a sketch player on shows “Jimmy Kimmel Live” and “Fresh Baked Videos” on Spike TV. Currently she can be seen in Showtime’s critically acclaimed documentary “I Am Comic” and her very own stand-up special “Here Comes Trouble.”

How did you get into comedy?
I was forced into it by my Russian immigrant parents. They said they didn't bring me to this country so that I could be a doctor or lawyer, they wanted me to tell jokes to drunks in a bowling alley in Arkansas. I'm glad I could fulfill their dreams and make them proud.

Growing up, did people say you were funny? Did you think you were funny?
I was always up to some sort of trouble as a kid. The one way I would get off scot-free was to make people laugh. My parents couldn't punish me for snatching my grandmother's dentures and fitting them into our Halloween jack-o-lantern if I was doing a spot on impression of my grandmother without her dentures chasing me around our house trying to smack me with her cane.

I became aware that I was using humor as self defense when I would get teased at school about something and instead of feeling bad about it I would retort with a funny comeback. Thanks to hormones and Russian genes, my face decided to grow a very slight moustache and some pimply faced 8th grade boy pointed it out in front of everyone at lunch one day. I didn't skip a beat. I asked him what a lame excuse for a 13 year old he was that a 12 year old girl could grow one and he couldn't. I told him to call me when his voice and balls dropped. I guess you could say Junior high was my first experience with hecklers. I think I made him cry and got detention for that. Then in high school I was in the principal's office every day, but that's because we were dating.