Steve Coogan Quotes

I always try to attack the most honest issues I can in my comedy.

A good comic explores the imagination, but it's always got to have those notes of truth running through it.

In good comedy, the structure comes from truth and that weird eye that looks at the way life is.

I don't claim that our TV comedies are highbrow in anyway, but I think there's a basis to them, and that's why they're more popular than other TV comedies. There's a basis of truth in them, a gut feeling.

It's good just to laugh sometimes, and if it comes out of some truth, it's even stronger.

Sure, I am funny and have a good sense of humor. Mostly, though, I just tell the truth. The internal dialogue people have in their heads - I just write it.

In order to be able to write a good joke, you have to find the truth.

There's truth in comedy, and that resonates with people of all races.

For me, the comedies that truly work are the ones that are grounded in some way. If it's all heightened, it's really hard. It's a little slippery. It's hard to get purchase on the side of the wall.

Comedy is just honesty. Whether things are going well or bad.

Different things made 'Cheers' and 'Frasier' special. Both of them, though, were honest. It was the old Shakespeare thing: Hold the mirror up to life.

The real heart of comedy is uncovering a truth about yourself or about the world that you didn't see.

I'll see something, and I'll go, 'Oh, wow, that's interesting,' because really, comedy comes from the truth.

I have no desire to get on a soapbox or be preachy. I don't think comedy needs to be 'brave' or 'important.'

And I think comedy obviously a great way to get a message out because you know the reason why things are funny is because they're true.

You have to be so honest in comedy.

Comedy too can sometimes discern what is right. I shall not please, but I shall say what is true.

I tell the truth and I don't try to sugarcoat things. But I also decided that if you don't use humor or satire, then it's just too dark all the time. And one of my favorite literary works is A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift. As you know, that was an enormously famous satire piece that was able to point out, you know, things to people in a different way. And I do believe that satire and humor can reveal truth in a way that sometimes doesn't get revealed through other means. And so I decided to, every now and then, use satire and humor as well.

You can be funny and say what you mean; these ideas are not mutually exclusive. Some of the best jokes came from people who meant it. See: Pryor, Bruce, Carlin, etc.

Humor distorts nothing, and only false gods are laughed off their earthly pedestals.

I like to spoof the original Gothic classics, so there is also good dose of comedy in the 'Parasol Protectorate' - giggling readers are good.

I think comedy stems from being honest, often painfully so. I hope I can achieve that perspective in my own life and also have fun.

I think comedy has to come from a real place. It has to come from an honest place.

Anybody can make jokes. But unless they come from conviction, and there's truth in them, you haven't nailed it. They aren't as funny as they could be, and they don't make a point.

The best comedy to me - and again, I grew up with comedy since I was a baby, so I've seen it all - is when you exaggerate the truth, like Richard Pryor did, you understand?