Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
The Dalai Lama visited the White House and told the President that he could teach him to find a higher state of consciousness. Then after talking to Bush for a few minutes, he said, 'You know what? Let's just grab lunch.'
I'm a citizen of the world. I like it that way. The world's a wonderful. I just think that some people are pretty badly represented. But when you speak to the people themselves they're delightful. They all want so little.
They got special terms that they use when they're pregnant. They don't even say pregnant, got special words they use - I'm expecting. Expecting what? I'm expecting a child, silly. Well, then, you probably got a good shot!
I don't always see humor in things. Especially when I smash my pinky toe into a coffee table leg in the middle of the night. But sometimes I'll see things, or experience things, that make me go, "Huh, maybe that's a bit."
When you denigrate people, they have two ways to fight back - with their fists and guns, or their mouths. And mouths are seemingly the easiest way to not get hit back. If people are laughing, they're not going to hit you.
It's really irritating. Even people who like my work sometimes come up to me and say, 'I usually don't like female comedians, but your material is great!' It makes the job prospect more daunting. Funny is funny, you know?
Even before I had an assistant, my calendar was color-coded and I had all these different e-mail rules for how to prioritize e-mails, so I made it a point years ago to figure all that stuff out because my life was a mess.
I get approached to do shows all the time. There's a lot of money in sitcoms, but I've never been the kind of guy who wanted to do one. I don't think people want to see me saying "Honey, I'm home." It's just not my thing.
All the family gatherings, I'm too tired, or I can't because it conflicts with work... I have seven grandkids. I've been missing recitals and graduations. To me, it's just not worth it. There is a better way to live life.
A lot of comics are kind of vampire types; we do our shows and disappear into the night. My philosophy was, this is like politics, and if I want people to know about my campaign, I'm going to go out there and shake hands.
I saw a dog in a cage. And that cage had a sign on it that said, 'I bite.' And I was like, 'That is good to know doggy, but that's not the most important thing about you. You should make a sign that says, 'I make signs.''
There's a thing about trying too hard, which I think is in all forms, which is if you really try to do things really well, you can get to a less good place than if you just let go and let it fly. Especially in creativity.
If you're trying to get a bit of attention, you can smash up your hotel room or spend all your time going to openings or doing the gossip column thing. I just decided to do gigs in French, German, Spanish, and in America.
My happiest memory of childhood was my first birthday in reform school. This teacher took an interest in me. In fact, he gave me the first birthday presents I ever got: a box of Cracker Jacks and a can of ABC shoe polish.
On the most Scottish thing he'd ever seen: I was going through a town called Bathgate at around 11 o'clock at night. And there was a guy leaning and pissing against a front door. He then took out his keys and went inside.
If you feel more emotion looking at a picture of queuing lorries than a picture of desperate humans living in a lay-by, you need to check your bedtime routine for someone beating you round the head with a meat tenderiser.
When I've mentioned things that I thought only happened to me, or thoughts that I felt had only had crossed my mind, the audience response indicated that they seemed to have happened to, or been thought of by many people.
Oh Beautiful for smoggy skies, insecticided grain, For strip-mined mountain's majesty above the asphalt plain. America, America, man sheds his waste on thee, And hides the pines with billboard signs, from sea to oily sea.
People love to admit they have bad handwriting or that they can't do math. And they will readily admit to being awkward: 'I'm such a klutz!' But they will never admit to having a poor sense of humor or being a bad driver.
I think we’re part of a greater wisdom that we will ever understand; a higher order, call it what you want. Know what I call it? The Big Electron. It doesn’t punish, it doesn’t reward, it doesn’t judge at all. It just is.
It used to be cars had cool names: Dart, Hawk, Fury, Cougar, Firebird, Hornet, Mustang, Barracuda. Now we have Elantra, Altima, Acura, Lumina, Sentra, Corolla, Maxima, Tercel. Further proof that America has lost its edge.
So I started to relax and would work on my act eight hours a day, sitting at a desk writing at my grandmother's house, and I would put on Richard Pryor Live on Long Beach and would play it like a loop and think and write.
I can at least hearken to a time when I didn't have a cell phone, where I had to call my mom after movies collect from a pay phone, and when they said, 'State your name,' I'd say, 'Mom, pick me up,' and hang up the phone.
Bob Dole revealed he is one of the test subjects for Viagra. He said on Larry King, 'I wish I had bought stock in it.' Only a Republican would think the best part of Viagra is the fact that you could make money off of it.
At the G-20 summit, the White House accidentally listed a phone-sex line for journalists seeking an on-record briefing call for Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. To which Bill said, 'Boy, did they get the wrong number.'
John Kerry keeping a low profile this week. He said he wanted to get away and go someplace where no one would expect to see him. So I guess he showed up at his old seat in the Senate. Nobody's going to look for him there.
I will do whatever is necessary to make better the stupidity on my part - and therefore go after those who are acting stupid themselves. It's not popular. You don't make friends when you do that. And I couldn't care less.
I took all my TV experience and what I learned about - by writing and directing and bringing a movie to Sundance - about the realities of the independent film market: 'Transparent' is the marriage of those two situations.
Normally, I think the people you would use on your first film, it would be a real struggle to bring them with you onto your television show. I just brought every single person with and expanded my little indie film world.
My kids are so dramatically different, but it's not like I would trade one in or like there's one I would pick over the other ones. I know that sounds like I'm bullshitting. I also have five of them so I barely know them.
You just have to believe in what you're saying and be able to explain why you said it. There's nothing I say that I can't back up or at least explain why I came to that conclusion, so I'm not afraid of getting in trouble.
I love improvisation. You can't blame it on the writers. You can't blame it on direction. You can't blame it on the camera guy... It's you. You're on. You've got to do it, and you either sink or swim with what you've got.
I knew that this was what I wanted to talk about on stage. There was no point being coy about it, or pretending that I wasn't gay. That was the substance of my whole act. If you took that away, there would be nothing left
I would become a priest or a rabbi or a monk or whatever the hell was necessary to perform miracles such as taking money from someone else's pocket and putting it into mine, still remaining within the confines of the law.
I believe in God... just in case. It's like there's some list somewhere and you don't want to be on it. I don't want to say THERE'S NO GOD! and then die and say, Oh, Hi... Is there some kind of community service I can do?
I don't like people telling other people what to do. Sex work for a lot of women is really important, especially in countries where women don't have a lot of power. Here we can have at least some form ... of making money.
I got out of school in 2000, and I always wanted to be on 'This American Life,' since I first started telling stories. And that, I mean, that show is a little bit of a fortress. It's really hard to get stuff on that show.
I don't know how to fix a car. If the car breaks down, and the gas tank does not say "E", I'm screwed. But if the gas tank says "E", I get all cocky - "I've got this one, don't worry." So I get out the toolbox AKA wallet.
The political arena is the funniest.They [politicians] are always pretending to change, but they never change. They're the best actors and actresses in the world. They've always been hilarious since the beginning of time.
That's the nice thing about doing stand-up. There's no development, you just go out there and get an immediate response as to whether something is good or bad. Getting a laugh is the best measure of how well you're doing.
When I was little, my dad was in the Air Force. He introduced me to Neil Armstrong, and Neil Armstrong signed my moon book. I had a little moon book, which I still have somewhere, and he signed it, and he died. It's true.
Yes, it gets better, but I also understand that saying to a 15-year-old that, 'Oh, don't worry, just wait a year', is like saying 'Wait a lifetime', but every single person has the right to go to school and not be afraid.
The only systems we can afford to employ are those that rationally serve the planet first, then all humanity. Not out of some woolly, bullshit tree-hugging piffle but because we live on it, currently without alternatives.
I'm a very ritualistic person. I have to wash my face twice, and on the second wash before I rinse, I brush my teeth, then I rinse, then I floss, then I put on moisturizer. I'm ritualistic. Jewishness is very ritualistic.
I worked at Sears in the Woodfield Mall as a gift wrapper. I'm actually a great gift wrapper, and the customers were so nice to me. I was only 16, and eventually Sears put me in customer service because I was so friendly.
I grew up in Solihull, on the edge of what was then the Birmingham conurbation. It was a good place to write comedy from. I didn't feel allegiance to anything. I didn't have working-class pride or upper-class superiority.
I don't understand people who travel purely gastronomically, who book a Michelin-starred restaurant three months in advance and suddenly find themselves in Copenhagen or Barcelona with a zeitgeist plate of snail porridge.
It's true; I have a skill and it's... it has not related to acting, it's not related to auditions, it's not related to studios, not related to public whim. It's whether I'm funny or not and whether I can entertain people.
I just want people to hold themselves to account about what they think more, because I strongly believe that the way to live a moral life is to not allow yourself to have beliefs which are easy but which don't make sense.
I was about sixteen when I discovered that music could get you laid, so I got into music boy, didn't matter what you looked like either, you could be a geeky looking guy but if you played music, whoa, you'd get the girls.