Lydic was born June 30, 1981, in Louisville, Kentucky. Aged three, Lydic became enamored of comedic acting from watching Carol Burnett play Miss Agatha Hannigan in Annie.[6] As a child, she enrolled in the Young Actors Institute at the Youth Performing Arts School and starred in a Kroger commercial. After she graduated from Eastern High School, she attended the University of Louisville for two semesters before deciding to make the biggest move of her life to that point. When she told her parents about her plans to move to Los Angeles, she wasn’t sure what to expect. “I think they saw this creative side in me growing up,” she said. “I'm so fortunate because a lot of people don't have families that would've supported them in making such a huge decision like that. But not only did they give me their blessing, my mom and dad packed up a U-Haul and drove us out all the way across the country.”(https://www.kentuckytotheworld.org/blog/desi-lydic-offers-a-new-political-discourse-in-kentucky) Lydic told Kyle Meredith in a 2024 interview that it was during this time that she had an obsession with late '90s Saturday Night Live.[7] She later moved to Los Angeles and became an improvisational actor, performing at The Groundlings and Improv Olympic.[8]
Career
Lydic in 2012
On The Daily Show with Trevor Noah, Lydic saw herself as a comedic actor with "a journalistic responsibility" to the truth, in regard to the serious topics she approaches through a humorous lens, as a correspondent for the show.[9] Lydic created her first one-hour special which aired on May 13, 2019, on Comedy Central, and was entitled The Daily Show with Trevor Noah Presents Desi Lydic: Abroad.[10] The special explores how the United States is now further apart in gender equality than many other countries in the world. The special was nominated for a Writers Guild Award.[11] After the passing of the Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Lydic paid tribute to her work, and life in a half-hour special entitled The Daily Show with Trevor Noah Presents: Remembering RBG – A Nation Ugly Cries with Desi Lydic aired on Comedy Central on October 30, 2020.[12][11] Lydic was among a number of guest hosts who hosted The Daily Show after the departure of Trevor Noah. Lydic hosted the show during the week of April 24, 2023.[13]
Personal life
Lydic has one son with her husband Gannon Brousseau.[14][15] Their son was born in late December 2015. While filming her Comedy Central special "Abroad"[10] Lydic got a "small upside-down triangle[16] tattoo representing female empowerment" as a commemoration of her time spent with Icelandic all-female rap collective Daughters of Reykjavík, marking her as the "23rd member" of the group.[17]
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