Rich Talarico

A former staff writer for MadTV and Saturday Night Live, Rich Talarico is a veteran of Chicago's Second City Theater. He worked for the National Touring Company and also created five original sketch revues for Second City resident companies, including The Psychopath Not Taken and Second City 4.0, its 40th anniversary revue. Rich was a staff writer and occasional bit player on MadTV for three seasons and also worked as a staff writer for Saturday Night Live.

Rich started his improv training in Chicago at Improv Olympic with Charna Halpern and Del Close. He began performing and eventually teaching at Improv Olympic in Chicago during the 1990s.

At IO Chicago, Rich was on the house team Mr. Blonde and played with the long running Armando Diaz Show. Rich also co-created the longform shows Trio and Dasariski. Also at Improv Olympic, Rich co-created and starred in several scripted shows including the smash musical The Roof is On Fiddler in the summer of 2001.

Rich now performs with Dasariski at the IO West theatre in Los Angeles, where he taught improv for many years. He has made over a dozen TV commercials and has done various film and TV appearances on shows such as HBO's The Sketch Pad, Late Night with Conan O'Brien as well as the feature film High Fidelity.

Hometown: Frankfort, NY

Rich Talarico