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When "Strangers" first aired two years ago as a piss-take on those weepy "After School Specials" of the '70s, the show tipped the scales with a warped wit rarely encountered on the small screen. Now, signed on for a third season on Comedy Central, "Strangers" remains a trusted outpost for those who find their funny well beyond the standard sitcom fare.

At center stage of the show is actress Amy Sedaris, who plays the rumpled chum-pot Jerri Blank. Blank is a former teen runaway who, after a lifetime of prostitution and drug abuse, has returned to high school as a freshman at age 46. With the possible exception of a special trailer park edition of "Cops," "Strangers" is the only place one is likely to encounter someone like Jerri Blank.

The character represents an amalgam of the fringe dwellers and human ruin that have held the imagination of Sedaris over the years. "The more serious they are and the more tragic they are, the more I'm drawn to them," she admits. "I'm usually the only person who'll ever talk to them and they tell me everything."

First, there was Bobbie. "I lived over this woman in Chicago and she was just trouble," relates Sedaris. "I mean, she had tattoos that she had tried to take off herself. She also always thought she was smelling formaldehyde. She'd call up and say, 'Hey, this is Bobbie downstairs ... Do I smell formaldehyde?'

"And she'd always drink too much and fall down. I'd constantly see her with a broken leg or a broken arm." While Bobbie proved an undeniably rich source for any performer to draw from, Sedaris also found inspiration from a late-'60s drug prevention film. "We found this documentary of this woman in the '60s who was a drug addict and a prostitute and she'd go to high schools and talk to students. The woman's name is Flurrie." Sedaris adds, "She looks like Michael Dukakis. She's horrific looking."

The final touch came when Sedaris approached the wardrobe people at Comedy Central during pre-production of the series and told them, "I just want to dress like someone who owns snakes." They responded with an assortment of outfits that overpoweringly evoked slutty '70s sleaze. Jerri Blank was born.

Sans the saddlebag thighs and prison tattoos that help define her TV character, Sedaris herself is pretty and diminutive. She is also considerably more laid-back, several RPMs slower than her TV persona, which comes off as a sort of manic, perverse Lucille Ball. Of her recent appearance on Conan O'Brien she groaned, "God, with all that fidgeting and unfocused energy I had, I looked like a damn monkey. So annoying."

Some call it quality entertainment.

Sedaris' Greenwich Village apartment is tidy, nearly sizable by Manhattan standards and distinguished by several personal decorative touches. Choice cuts of plastic meat are placed throughout the living room. The TV is adorned with a large plastic turkey. "I covered it with foil for Thanksgiving and the people who came over were extremely disappointed when they found out it wasn't real." There is also a stuffed squirrel featured prominently on a coffee table. "I really like squirrels. My whole family does. We all like small woodland creatures."

Hard to say why it comes as a surprise that Sedaris and her family hail from North Carolina. But it is her home state nonetheless. When asked what her life might have been like if she had remained there instead of defecting to the North, Sedaris quickly responds, "If I had stayed in North Carolina, I'd be wearing ruffles or a uniform. You know, waitressing and taking care of a stroke victim ... I probably would have been dating him, too, by now."

Not surprisingly, Sedaris grew up in an open, permissive household where creative expression was never discouraged. "We all did our little plays in our house," she says. "For a long time I had an imaginary classroom. I'd come home from school, put on my mom's high heels and go right to the back bedroom where I had a wall that was one big chalkboard and I would teach my imaginary students. This went on for years and years. Then I realized I was too old to do this, so then I just kind of did it to myself in my head. I still do that -- like if I'm making an omelet I pretend it's a cooking show and I'm teaching someone."

Sedaris' lifelong fascination with costumes and wigs has also been lovingly nurtured. "In the first grade I got my first wig. It was a fall and I still have it," she says, gesturing to her closet. "Since then I get two wigs for Christmas usually. When I was a kid I'd go shopping with my dad every Friday night and I wore a different wig every time I went," she adds.

True to her craft, Sedaris would remain in character the entire time she and her father were at the grocery store. "It was mostly neighbors that I would imitate. I think most kids probably did that stuff, I just stuck with it," Sedaris says with a shrug.

The subject of wigs has Sedaris bounding off to another room. She returns with a photo she had done with the help of a makeup artist friend. It is a large color print of Sedaris as Angie Dickinson at the peak of her "Police Woman" period. The likeness is staggering. Sedaris is a convincing blond, and with a gold turtleneck and pistol poised, the transformation is utter and complete.

Next page | "I want to be so beautiful that I'm ugly"