Funny Girl

By Jenny Block

Goldberg grew up in Albuquerque, the youngest of three children raised by a single mother. When she was 17 and attending Manzano High School, she performed stand-up for the first time at her high school talent show… and she won, despite it not going quite as planned.

“I was wearing a pair of jeans, a button-down and a tie with polar bears on it, and I’m talking about my boyfriends and why it’s not working out so well,” Goldberg said. “And now I’m like, maybe it wasn’t working out so well because of my tie and button-down collection.”

Goldberg (’01 BA), who makes her living today as a working writer and comedian with a standup routine based on observational humor and politics, says comedy is something that has always lived inside of her.

“When I was younger, I used to listen to the Comic Relief team with Whoopi Goldberg, Robin Williams and Billy Crystal,” she says. “I don’t think I realized it at the time, but I was absorbing everything and I was studying and it was just something that I wanted to do.”

While Goldberg was attending The University of New Mexico, she went every year to see a show in Albuquerque called Funny Lesbians for a Change, which served as a fundraiser for higher education scholarships for women in the community.

“I saw some of my now colleagues headlining and I wanted to know what that laughter felt like,” says Goldberg, even though she would not get on a comedy stage for years.

Goldberg enrolled at UNM to study criminology and English, thinking she would teach English in prisons. She switched majors to communications with a math minor and finally landed on physical education, aiming to be a gym teacher, and graduated in seven years.

She came out as gay at 18 and found UNM to be a safe space as she found her community.

“I think just being able to go to such an outstanding school that was so close to home gave me an opportunity to continue to find myself being a newly out lesbian in a community where I felt accepted, I felt safe, and I felt like I could be myself on the campus,” Goldberg says. “It’s a place where people can feel safe and not just accepted, but celebrated.”

She bartended at Applebee’s to pay the bills while she was in college and student teaching. “Every once in a while, one of my students’ parents would come in and be like, ‘You made my child care about school again.’” Goldberg remembers.

“I affected the kids in the most beautiful way. I loved it. But I also had this dream gnawing at me that I really wanted to keep pursuing.”

Goldberg found she could make more money bartending full time than teaching and continued to attend Funny Lesbians for a Change when the show came through town. She confessed her dream of doing standup to the woman she was dating, who encouraged her to audition for the show. Goldberg finally took her advice but arrived after the audition closed and was told to come back in a year. During that year, the two stopped seeing each and the woman moved away. Not long after, Goldberg discovered that she had been killed in a plane crash.

“And, so, it was one of those watershed moments in your life where you go, ‘What do I really want to do?’” Goldberg says. “And she believed in me and she went to that audition with me. So, sort of in her memory and because of her encouragement, I went back and auditioned the next year and they gave me a seven-minute set in front of 650 people at the KiMo Theatre in downtown Albuquerque.”

The show was a turning point in Goldberg’s life. “I hit my first big joke and I heard the most deafening laughter I’d ever heard, and I was like, this is what I’m supposed to be doing. And I knew I wanted to be on stage.”

The 47-year-old, who now lives in Los Angeles, says things started falling into place after that. She performed regularly at a comedy club in Albuquerque and videotaped her sets. She sent the tapes to Olivia Travel, “the travel company for lesbians and LGBTQ+ women,” and got a gig. She is now a long-time regular aboard their cruises and on their resort trips.

“Dana is an incredible comedic activist and her ability to combine the two in an LGBTQ+ frame is so timely and effective,” says Judy Dlugacz, the co-founder and president of Olivia Travel. “Off-stage, Dana is caring and such a kind being! I have watched her grow up in comedy and am so proud of the work she does in such a smart, funny way.”

In 2007 Goldberg started a one- night comedy show in Albuquerque called The Southwest Funny Fest, which, up until the pandemic, she produced for 13 years.

The format brought together Goldberg and three other female headlining comedians from HBO, Showtime or Last Comic Standing for a one-night show to benefit either New Mexico AIDS Services or Equality New Mexico.

Albuquerqueans crave comedy and make for an incredible audience, says Goldberg, who made the show all-women to ensure women got the stage time they deserved.

“Most importantly, I wanted to continue to give back to a community that helped me get my start. And, so, it was a reciprocal relationship where I brought something to them that they wanted and they continued to come out and sell out the KiMo Theatre year after year.” She’s hoping to bring the show back this year.

In 2009, Goldberg’s career took a turn toward fundraising work when an auctioneer dropped out at a gala for the Human Rights Campaign in San Francisco.

“Someone on the board emailed me and said, ‘Do you know how to do a live auction?’ she recalls. “And I was like, ‘Let’s find out.’ So, I got on stage and I found a way to combine my comedy with some strange dormant gift of fundraising and live auctioneering that I never learned professionally, but just lives inside me, and pulled off one of the best live auctions that the gala had ever seen.”

Joe Solmonese, the president of the Human Rights Campaign at the time, was so impressed with Goldberg’s performance that he invited her to be a part of HRC and the organization’s national dinner in Washington, D.C.

“And so later that year,” she says, “I got on stage and went on between then-President Barack Obama and Lady Gaga.”

When Goldberg emceed, organizations raised big money.

“I found a very beautiful combination of comedy and fundraising,” she says. “When people are happy, they donate and they give.”

“Her remarkable talent for injecting humor into our advocacy efforts, all while mobilizing crucial resources for pressing causes, is unparalleled,” Says Kelley Robinson, the current president of the Human Rights Campaign & Human Rights Campaign Foundation. “She effortlessly blends laughter and heartfelt concern, providing both relief during tough times and renewed vigor to our mission.”

Working with HRC opened doors to the Trevor Project, GLAAD, Planned Parenthood, Lambda Legal, and other organizations. For the past five years, Goldberg has hosted the annual fundraising gala for the Child Rescue Coalition, a Florida-based nonprofit that helps law enforcement catch and prosecute child predators.

“She has been a big part of us growing that event from a small gathering of local supporters to being a sold-out and greatly anticipated gala in Palm Beach County,” says Carly Yoost, co-founder and CEO of Child Rescue Coalition. “People have described our event as being a wonderful ride that Dana takes you on, where one minute you are laughing, then brought to tears, then standing from your chair cheering.”

Goldberg’s career has allowed her to work with a roster of celebrities, including film and stage star Kristin Chenoweth. The two met at the Trevor Project gala and then finally shared the stage at the Gay Chorus of San Francisco gala in 2019, at which Chenoweth performed. After that, they continued to appear together at a number of events and became fast friends.

Chenoweth describes Goldberg’s topical humor as “balls to the walls.” “It’s something to behold when you’re watching her make everybody laugh,” Chenoweth says. “Not just people who agree with her — everybody. And not a lot of comedians, and dare I say women, have that quality, without overstepping. She can overstep and you still find yourself laughing.”

Chenoweth has long been an ally to the LGBTQ community.

“Comedians like Dana are so vital and so important to the community,” she says. “Not just to be heard, but to be able to laugh at oneself and to be able to discuss politics and laugh; and make it a meaningful conversation is really important. And she does all of these with aplomb.” As Goldberg reflects on her career, she is grateful for the life she has crafted and for the moments she will never forget.

“I get to do this because I know how to make people laugh,” she says. “I get to see the world because I bring joy to people, and there’s a value to that in our society. There’s a value to making people happy in our society.”

Robinson of the HRC agrees. “Her work has allowed us to gain the resources to elect more LGBTQ+ elected leaders than ever before and to mobilize more Equality voters than ever too — at a time when our world desperately needs real leadership,” Robinson says. “If you were to ask me for the name of one of the most important people that is fueling the movement for LGBTQ+ equality, I would say Dana Goldberg.”