Chevy Chase Quotes

To do comedy, you have to be a pretty good actor to start with.

Watching a good actor is the best way to learn.

I had no musical or athletic ability, and I wasn't particularly good looking. Comedy was something I could do for attention.

For me, there's a fine line between being a cheeseball and being a good performer.

I understand that being able to appeal to the public and having an amazing sense of humour is not something that comes easy. It's definitely a gift and for which I'm thankful.

I think to be a good actor you need either a good experience of life or education, or both.

Even when I was an engineer, I was a comic on my job. At birthday and holiday parties, I was the one scheduling and emceeing. If you work on your gift, and you're good, it will shine through.

Stand-up comedy is not a man's job. It's an alpha job: To be the only person in a room with a microphone who's allowed to talk.

Maybe I can't act, but I know the gimmicks. I studied acting all my life and know what's good for me.

The difference between great actors and the rest of us isn't simply that they know how to make more out of less, but that, like lions at the watering hole, they will always take more than their share from the pool of available resources - extra air from the room, added knowledge from our faces.

There are two main jobs in acting - the first one is to be a good actor, and the second one is to convince everyone that you're a good actor.

I think all great actors - and I don't classify myself as one of them, incidentally - but I think all great actors listen well and I've learned that from a lot of the very good actors with whom I've worked - to really listen to what people say.

I'm like a big 10-year-old when I'm on stage. I just go up there and do whatever I think is cool at the moment.

I always have to come back to shows to take out the improvements actors have put in. Laughs are addictive, and sometimes they're good laughs, and sometimes they're bad laughs.

To be a good actor, you have to be very smart. But to be a great actor, you also have to have a streak of, 'I'm an idiot, a complete lunatic.'

I feel that I am a good actor.

The first thing you have to get used to in any kind of acting is the ability to make a fool of yourself. If you haven't learnt how to make a fool of yourself, you shouldn't be on the boards. That's absolutely what it's all about.

Beyond any role that I ever had, really early on as a stand-up, I would see actors decide to try it and they would bomb miserably. What I realized was that stand-up, acting and writing are all their own disciplines.

It is a great rush to come up with a joke that gets a good response from the audience. It's gold!

One of the things I think you need to be a good emcee is silliness. And I'm basically a silly guy.

I think anybody can be a good actor.

I started off on stage because it was the only work I could get. I haven't been back for 11 years. I think any stage experience is good experience, as far as being an actor is concerned.

Good acting is thinking in front of the camera. I just do that and apply a sense of humor to it. You have to trust the audience to get it.

Every director should take an acting class.

It takes two years on the stage for an actor or an actress to learn how to speak correctly and to manage his voice properly, and it takes about ten years to master the subtle art of being able to hold one's audience.