"I grew up really poor in Georgia. There were seven of us in a two-bedroom, one-bathroom trailer. I remember when my brother went to prison. He wrote me a letter.  "Dear Bobbie ... This place is a palace! They only got two guys to a room! They eat three times a day! I want to stay here forever!"  He said, "They try to let me outta here, I'm gonna kill somebody!"

—Bobby Oliver at the Ice House in Pasadena

"I grew up in a trailer park. My daddy heard me say that once and got so mad. He said, 'You are not from a trailer park. We owned our own trailer and land.' I was like, 'Oh, sorry. I should have told that to the bullies beating me up at the bus stop every day: 'Stop hitting me! You don't understand. We own our own trailer!'" 

—Bobbie Oliver at "Maria Bamford's Eagle Rock Singalong and Comedy Show," Center for the Arts, Eagle Rock

If the above anecdotes sound like they're straight out of Luke and Bo Duke territory, well … that's because they are.  Comedian Bobbie Oliver's trailer park childhood was in small-town, Athens-adjacent Covington, GA: the on-location backdrop for The Dukes of Hazzard television series.

Oliver doesn't talk moonshine and muscle cars on stage. "I concentrate on my insane family and I talk about the South through that," she says with a laugh. Oliver has performed at clubs all over Los Angeles and the southern United States. "Every single story I tell about my family on stage is true," she says.

Oliver's honesty about her dysfunctional family is also a perfect example of the philosophy she shares with students at her StandUp Academy, based at the Ice House Comedy Club in Pasadena. "It's about being true on stage. We don't do formulas or characters or catch phrases," says the self-described "comedy guru," adding: "We focus on the art of comedy."

Oliver has taught her technique, which she calls the "Tao of Comedy," to 450 people over three years and a book by the same name is in the works. Stand-up comedy, she explains, is a "unique skill—I've done comedy for 22 years and I still take classes." She adds: "You have to perfect your product—by the time comics get jokes right, they're sick of them."

Oliver and many of her friends in the comedy community, including students, will be just a few of the 150-plus comedians cracking wise at 12 Eagle Rock venues tonight and Thursday night at the 1^st Eagle Rock Comedy Festival. The festival concludes with a "Best of the Fest" on Dec. 12 at the Ice House in Pasadena, which is sponsoring the event along along with the Black Boar Pub in Eagle Rock. The Center for the Arts, Eagle Rock, is co-producing the festival with Oliver via her StandUp Productions.

"In the 13 years I've lived here, I've always wanted to bring comedy to Eagle Rock," Oliver gushes. "Eagle Rock is perfect. It's Mayberry." The producers want to make sure comedy was accessible to everyone, so, like the Center for the Arts-produced Eagle Rock Music Festival, the event is free. "This is not a money-making venture," Oliver confirms. "I'm just trying to bring comedy to Eagle Rock. I just want to put Eagle Rock on the map."

For complete information about the 1^st Annual Eagle Rock Festival, including venues, addresses, and artist line-ups, go to www.centerartseaglerock.org or www.standupproductions.net. For more info about Bobbie Oliver and/or StandUp Academy, visit www.bobbieoliver.net or www.standupacademy.net.