Amber Ruffin

Amber Mildred Ruffin (born January 9, 1979) is an American comedian, writer and actress. She hosts her own late-night talk show titled The Amber Ruffin Show on NBC and Peacock. She has been a writer for Late Night with Seth Meyers since 2014. When she joined the show she became the first Black woman to write for a late-night network talk show in the United States. In January 2021, she co-authored a book with her sister Lacey Lamar titled You'll Never Believe What Happened to Lacey: Crazy Stories about Racism which made the New York Times Best Seller list. They released a second book, The World Record Book of Racist Stories, in 2022. In 2022, Ruffin and her writing partner Jenny Hagel, co-founded their production company Straight to Cards under their overall deal with Universal Television. Early life and education Ruffin was born in Omaha, Nebraska. She graduated from Benson High School in 1996. Ruffin is the youngest of five children. As a child Ruffin learned Signing Exact English to communicate with a deaf neighbor. Career In 2001, Ruffin began performing in local theater productions and improv in Omaha. While performing with her improv troupe at an event in Chicago, Ruffin met comedian and owner of iO Theater Charna Halpern. Halpern encouraged Ruffin to move to Chicago saying she believed Ruffin would "have a full-time job, doing comedy, within the year". In 2008 after finishing her classes at iO, Ruffin moved to Amsterdam to work as a writer and performer on the improv comedy troupe Boom Chicago Amsterdam.