"I am honored to be the first winner of the Mark Twain Prize recognized not for humor, but for my work as a riverboat pilot," O'Brien said in a release from The Kennedy Center.

As a recipient of The Mark Twain Prize for American Humor, O'Brien joins a who's who of American comedy that includes Richard Pryor, George Carlin, Lily Tomlin, Whoopi Goldberg and Kevin Hart.

Before Kathy Griffin’s new stand-up tour, “My Life On The PTSD-List,” stops at D.C.’s Warner Theatre on Saturday, she spoke to WTOP about the people that inspired her to go into comedy and what’s ...