Margaret Smith, winner of the Ninth Annual American Comedy award for Best Stand-Up Comic, Female, in 1994, makes dysfunctional family life the backbone of her act. "Deadpan delivery", "blank-faced", and "funny" sums up her dark humor. She is one child out of six in a demented, dysfunctional Middle American family. But she contends that all families are dysfunctional in some way or another.

Smith left home for college and needed money. Since she was from Chicago, she applied, successfully, for a job at Second City, which would pay half of her school tuition. That gig lasted three-and-a-half years and included writing many of the group's sketches. Eventually, she gravitated to New York City, where she began her stand-up career.