Rob Huebel Quotes

A lot of the time, a comedy script is just dialogue, and that's the main thing you have to worry about.

Here's the thing, with comedy - and I learned this from Will Ferrell - you can't be ashamed. If you're doing comedy, you have to fully commit to the joke. Shame is not part of it. If you act shy or uncomfortable about your body, that makes the audience shy and uncomfortable. And in a comedy you just want them to loosen up and laugh.

Sometimes an actor will stumble on the joke, and I'm right on them. Back it up before the audience hears the bad version of the joke, because humor is 90% surprise. If they know what's coming, they won't laugh as hard.

Comedy is just to me, maybe it's a natural knack, if I can see where the joke is in the writing and I can see where the setup is and I can tell this is the way to make it.

The basic function of a comic is stand-up because it's so straightforward and simple. If the audience don't laugh, you didn't do your job. I've had some audiences where I didn't care if they laughed or not because they were either too drunk or stupid.

At this point, I feel fairly comfortable in terms of performance. I think having a sketch background actually helps a lot. Because my background is acting, and stand-up, in a lot of ways, is acting.

When you're a standup comic, you get up and you try stuff, and you're always kind of seeing how far you can push things.

As a comedian, I'm forced to have a tough skin. Until people laugh, they are detractors. You walk into a new audience where nobody knows you, they go: 'Make us laugh. Show us what you're made of. Prove why we should be listening to you.'

I like to approach comedy from character, to have the stakes for the individuals in the story be very high.

The straight man has the best part. He gets to be in the show and see it, too.

Impressions are still kind of hard for me and not what I love to do the most, but with characters, I think there's an element of fearlessness. You try to figure out the best reading and wording of the jokes before the show, and then you just really have to go hard.

I'm very interested in any script that makes me laugh.

Even writing a script which will be funny is not easy. To make the script come to life and make the audience laugh, I will call myself more of an actor if I am able to do that.

I think, in comedy, you only hit about one or two great characters in your career. Sometimes my character will be just a sketch... what is the funniest situation to put this person in?

If you're not doing something or saying something in comedy, the camera is going to go somewhere else.

Black audiences are probably the toughest for me to make laugh. I've gotten pretty good at performing for them, but it's still a challenge.

I feel the life expectancy of a comedian is 30 seconds. If you don't hook an audience in half-a-minute, you're dead.

The great thing about writing jokes for President Obama is that he is not afraid to tell jokes that are actually funny - and not just funny for a politician.

I had a standup act, and I ended up turning it into something that was really watered down and accessible. Something that went from scary and threatening to something that was almost to the point of being corny.

What can I say? I was there at the right place and with the right people. My theatre background helped a lot in shaping my comic streak.

When they first start doing comedy, new comics or even people that have only been doing it three or four years, they're doing an impersonation of a stand-up. This is what I think a stand-up should sound like.

Everyone knows the feeling where you're in the pub and you make your mates laugh. It's awesome, you feel like you rock. That's what comedians want with a bit of extra ego.

I once did a flip-flop joke in San Diego, and I got booed... but it's all in good fun.

Comedians who aren't screenwriters are telling jokes that they themselves think are funny. They're expressing their own view of what they think funny is.

I give importance only to the story of a movie.