Employers: Comedy clubs, TV and film production companies

Openings: Open mic or amateur nights at local clubs

Salary Cap: Sky's the limit; Will Ferrell makes $40 million a year

Number of Jobs: Thousands

A standup comic and one of the stars of Fox's late-night comedy series, Mad TV, Lee is taking a breather outside the show's Hollywood soundstages after playing John McCain as a contestant on So You Think You Can Dance. (In the sketch, Lee's McCain does a dusty waltz with his wife Cindy, and then proudly notes how he "got jiggy with it.") Although the Korean-American Lee has made a name for himself with his repertoire of memorable Asian characters—such as the Blind Kung-Fu Master, who doesn't notice his black belt is actually white and a scenery-chewing North Korean scientist who mugs his way through his 15 minutes of fame in a propaganda film—he's particularly proud that he was tapped to portray the Republican presidential candidate. "It didn't matter that I was a different race," notes Lee. "Funny is funny."

Lee, who grew up outside San Diego, broke into showbiz in 1995 when the coffee shop where he was working went out of business. "I literally went next door to get a job," he recalls, "and next door was the Comedy Store."

After washing dishes and doing odd chores there for $25 a shift, Lee was invited by the club's manager to go onstage during an open mic night. Soon he was doing three nights a week as a regular, and when Pauly Shore saw his act, he asked Lee to open for him in Las Vegas. "It all happened really fast," Lee says.

Lee joined Shore and other comedians on the road (including Andrew Dice Clay), and though the experience was valuable, the payoff wasn't. While sometimes he'd get paid several hundred dollars a week, other times there'd be months without any gigs. "That's what comedy is," says Lee. "For the first eight or so years, you're pretty much doing it for free."

After moving to L.A. and surviving on commercial work for a few years, Lee leveraged a personal connection to get an audition for Mad TV. He impressed producers and joined the show in 2001, but spent most of his first two seasons riding the bench. "I was Asian, and they just didn't know what to do with me," says Lee. He persevered however, and managed to get some routines on the air—just as a certain internet phenomenon was taking hold.

"YouTube saved my career," says Lee. Mad TV's sketch-comedy format proved to be perfect fodder for the video-sharing site, and Lee's racially themed bits, which showcased his manic, un-P.C. style, were especially popular. A parody of Memoirs of a Geisha starring a cross-dressing Lee garnered more than 3.5 million views. "Overnight, people started recognizing me."

Lee is now a headliner, in demand at comedy clubs and college campuses around the country. These days he can clear a couple of thousand dollars for a single show, and he recently shot a pilot for Comedy Central. He's also looking to delve into features, and snagged a small role in the recent Pineapple Express. "It'll happen," he says confidently about a potential movie career. "And if it doesn't, it doesn't. But I'm not going to quit. If there's one thing you learn from being in comedy, it's that you can't give up. Ever."