One of Ten: Tina Fey

(Note: These are in no specific order of influence. Tina Fey is the one that inspired me to do these posts.)


I love my life. I do. I'm incredibly comfortable in my own skin and abilities, but there are some days where I just want to be Tina Fey. She's probably my biggest role model, and easily one of my favorite celebrities. I can't think of anyone I have more respect and admiration for than Tina Fey. She's worked incredibly hard to get to where she is today.

For those of you that don't know Fey so well, here's a recap on her life:

-She graduated from the University of Virginia in 1992 with a BA in Drama
-After graduation, she moved to Chicago to attend classes at Second City. Two years later, she was part of the cast.
-In 1997 she became a writer for Saturday Night Live (SNL), and in 1999 she was the show's first female headwriter
-In 2000 she became a co-anchor on SNL's Weekend Update sketch with Jimmy Fallon. She hosted the segment until 2004
-Not only did she write (one of my favorite movies) "Mean Girls" in 2004, she also starred in it.
-She left SNL in 2006 to write, produce, and star in her own show 30 Rock
-She has seven Emmys, two Golden Globes, 3 SAG Awards. She was one of Barbara Walters' 2008 "10 Most Fascinating People" along with a whole slew of other accolades (including being one of People's 50 Most Beautiful in the World)

Look at that. All of this before she's 40 (she's 38).

Tina Fey is brilliant. She got in from the inside of the business. She went from writing the scripts behind the scenes to being the star of the screen--while still writing the scripts. She's also the producer of 30 Rock.

Two years ago when the Writer's Guild of America went on strike, Tina was out in front of Rockefeller Center picketing with her fellow writers and actors (on a side note, I tried to get my mom to go to New York during the strike so I could go hang out with Tina and the countless other actors and writers. It didn't work).

On top of all of this, Tina is still normal. She handled coming out of the writer's room very gracefully. She went from being moderately famous to one of Barbara Walters' most fascinating people (thanks to the GOP's VP candidate) in what seemed like a matter of minutes.

From SNL to Mean Girls to 30 Rock to being Sarah Palin, Tina Fey's got it all.

Here's a quote from her interview with Vanity Fair:

Everybody wants to be Tina Fey, I tell her. Who do you want to be?

“I don’t want to be somebody else,” she says.

And why would she?