Alonzo, who is Mexican American and grew up in an immigrant household, has used her comedian status to break barriers, becoming the first Latina to create and star in her own sitcom, "Cristela."
While not overly familiar with comedy as a profession, a young Alonzo was able use her upbringing to craft the skill that she is known for today.
She spoke with Arlan Hamilton about the connections between laughter and family.
"Growing up without money actually helped my performance skills because my family, we used to make each other laugh a lot," Alonzo explained. "There were times where our electricity was cut off. It's when you have those moments where you're kind of just in the silence [that] you realize that you make you make each other laugh, and you entertain yourselves, and I realized that I was doing that with my family."
Despite the close relationship between Alonzo's career and her family, she often felt guilty about making a successful career out of a skill that requires less labor than her mother, who worked in a Mexican restaurant. Still, Alonzo is grateful for her career, especially because it has allowed her to give back to her family.
"With my family, we're learning how to have fun," she said. "For me, the money has allowed me to ascend my family to a point where we can all go out and do things we've never been able to do."
Watch episode 5 of "Our America: In the Black Conversations" with Arlan Hamilton and Cristela Alonzo now in the video player above or wherever you stream this station on Roku, Apple TV, FireTV or Google TV.
Alexis Johnson-Fowlkes, Jason Honeycutt, Luke Richards contributed to this report.