Camy Lyn Faircloth likes to think of herself as one of Seattle’s best-behaved comedians.
That’s why it’s a little odd that she was considered Seattle’s best “Girl Behaving Badly,” and will appear on the Oxygen network’s all-female hidden-camera prank show.
“Girls Behaving Badly” kicks off its fourth season with highlights from the Seattle audition mixed in with some pranks by the regular cast at 10 tonight on the Oxygen cable network. (Check local listings for availability).
The episode featuring her prank airs at 5:30 p.m. Saturday and again at 8:30 p.m. Sunday.
Faircloth, 29, of Tukwila, outlasted about 100 other women during an audition in April at Seattle’s Comedy Underground.
“I wasn’t going to go. It just happened that the night before the audition, one of the gals who headed up the contest called me up,” Faircloth said. “So, just for a lack of better things to do, I was like, OK.”
During her two-minute audition, Faircloth read a list of 10 reasons why she should be picked for the show.
But it was her unique impression of an orangutan that caught the attention of the judges, the show’s regular cast members. Faircloth, who said the impression guarantees her a lifetime of being single, pulled the bottom half of her shirt up over her stomach and hopped around the small stage like a primate.
“Camy just exuded this sense of fearlessness,” cast member Shondrella Avery said in a phone interview from Los Angeles. “When that gut came rolling out, I, like, literally died. I knew she was the winner before she was done. If you’re willing to go out on a limb for the sake of comedy, that’s what we need.”
At the end of the day, Faircloth was the winner and was packing for a trip to Los Angeles in May, where she got the star treatment. She joined winners from New York, Chicago, Denver and Atlanta.
“I think they did a fantastic job of making us feel like little stars,” Faircloth said. “It was neat to see the other side of it. They put us up in nice hotels and we took a limo to and from Universal Studios.”
Faircloth said she’d been unemployed for a couple of months before the April audition came calling. She’d been doing comedy around Seattle for about four years and thought she had a decent shot.
But being in front of the hidden cameras wasn’t as easy as it looks on the screen.
There’s a script for the actors at the start, but they have to react to everything the “mark” – who some might call the victim – does. All the while, they have to be aware of where the hidden cameras are and follow instructions coming to them from a small ear piece from producers.
“At one point they told me I was blocking the mark from the camera and I needed to change seats,” Faircloth said. “So I had to find some strange motivation to just get up and move two chairs down.
“It was very improvisational. With this one guy, we were trying to maneuver him to get angry, but he was just the nicest guy in the world.”
The real irony is that Faircloth has never been comfortable with pranks and practical jokes.
“I get really uncomfortable,” she said. “I have this weird compassion for the people they’re pranking.”
Faircloth said she enjoyed the trip, but never caught the bug to move to Los Angeles and take her shot at Hollywood.
“I have a very clean show,” she said. “Basically, the same material I do on stage, I do in church. I don’t know that I would fit into all of that world.”
She’d like to get into radio shows or doing comedy tours through prisons in different states.
“My desire would be maybe a different route than other people have taken,” she said. “I don’t want to spend my life doing comedy in bars.”
Reporter Victor Balta: 425-339-3455 or vbalta@heraldnet.com.
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