A sparkplug comic performer, Lea DeLaria broke taboos and new ground in her now famous 1993 appearance on Arsenio Hall's talk show when she parade around screaming "I'm a big bull dyke!" Not that anyone would confuse her with a demure young thing, but her declaration as an "out" performer came years before Ellen DeGeneres' and at a time when gays and lesbians were still virtually invisible on the small screen. Since then, DeLaria has tackled stage and screen and displayed her prodigious musical talents in nightclubs and on Broadway.

The daughter of jazz pianist Robert DeLaria, she actually