Kenneth Lonergan Quotes

I think it's true of every great comedy that it's rooted in some dramatic, incredibly personal truth. And it's true of all great drama that there has to be comedy.

I naturally think in terms of comedy whenever I see anything because tragedy is so close to comedy, so I like to add the tragedy to the comedy or a little bit of comedy to the tragedy in order to make them both feel more real to me.

There's comedy even in tragedy. There's comedy in life. And in 'Castle', we go for that comedy.

If you stretch tragedy, it will always become comedy. That's the comedy that I like.

Comedy is drama. I think that if your characters are feeling something that is very real, then they have to respond in a way that feels real to them, and some situations, the only response you could possibly have is to respond in a way that's so extreme that people are going to laugh.

The energy in a comedy is very serious. Somebody said comedy is a tragedy plus time. When you have a tragedy, for example, like this, like, 'We're going to die,' and you have time, like, five hours to die, it becomes a comedy.

It's a cliche, but it's true that all the fun lies in baddies, grotesques and comic roles.

I think that there's a fine line between comedy and drama. I think that ultimately, the less winking that's going on when you're doing comedy - and this is just my own thing, and maybe it's why I've never been hired in comedy except by Bill Lawrence - but I think that the less winking you do with comedy, the better off you are.

If you stretch tragedy, it will always become comedy.

Tragedy without comedy is melodrama, and comedy without a higher purpose is vacant.

Believe it or not, there's a lot of humor in 'Mad Men.' Especially in the dark moments.

Much of the best humor is found in the frequently tragic reality of human experience.

I think all good drama is funny. All the best drama is ultimately very funny. Life is funny. You can't have any honest treatise on life without bumping into some humor.

I love down-and-dirty and grit. But I do think that my favorite dramas are ones that are dark comedies because I think that the only way the audience and the actor can really go as dark and deep as you may want to go is if there's some levity added to it.

Humor is the only way to tell a story. Especially the dark ones.

Comedy is tragedy revisited.

Comedy defends the commonplace; tragedy explodes it.

I think Georges Feydeau said comedy is just tragedy speeded up.

In comedy, something may be more absurd, but you have to believe just as much as you do when you're doing drama.

Dramas make me laugh. The other day, I saw 'The Place Beyond the Pines,' and I was giggling the whole time. I laugh when I'm uncomfortable.

I think that sometimes only comedians can reach the peaks of tragedy.

I don't really find things funny unless they're deeply tragic at the same time. I think if you're funny just for the sake of being funny, it's just frivolous nonsense. To me, all the best comic plays have been written about really serious and rather bleak things.

It's great extremes which leads to great drama and great comedy.

I always found that drama, really good drama, has a lot of comedy in it.

I think Britain has this tradition which suggests that if you make the readers laugh too much, you can't really be serious. Whereas, I think one of the functions laughter can perform in a book, as in life, is that it's a reaction to genuine horror.