Lawrence O'Donnell Quotes

I really enjoyed doing stand-up. Andy Kaufman was a big hero of mine. I tried to do conceptual stuff like he tried to do.

Being a correspondent on 'The Daily Show' is some combination of doing a character and doing stand-up. It's a juggling act to find a balance between being you and playing a role.

I was heavily influenced by Andy Kaufman and Steven Wright.

I thought 'Borat' was a breakthrough comedy, because it was really funny. It wasn't some studio-produced script with 14 writers.

To be honest, I never, ever thought I'd ever do comedy. I was so frequently cast early on as a high-born young man with... 'problems' and, later, as a heavy, from black-hatted western villains to the corporate raider to bad cops.

My heroes, growing up, were people like Andy Kaufman and Groucho Marx and people that very rarely drop the persona.

There's very little you could do to prepare to be a correspondent on 'The Daily Show,' because it's not being a journalist, it's not being an actor. It involves elements of both of those things, but they're not required necessarily as job experience. It's helpful if you know how to improvise, but again, not a requirement.

I never set out to do a sketch show.

Because I just loved to spend two years of my life in the company of Andy Kaufman and other characters.

Comedy will always be central to what I do, it's just an instinct for me, but I am a writer and always have been.

When I talk to Steve Martin, he's joyful when he talks about comedy.

I've always been a fan of Andy Kaufman.

We were the only ones interested in comedy. Everybody else wanted to be Martin Scorsese.

I don't know what Tracy Morgan does onstage, but I can assure you, it's no act.

I think people are purists about what sketch comedy should be, and I think sometimes having too much fun can be a little annoying to some people.

Anyone can go out on stage and start beating people over the head with rubber chickens. That'll get people's attention.

The genius of the Marx Brothers is for parody. They never are themselves. They exist too abundantly to be content with being that - they must go on, by the rapidest of transitions, to being something else. Groucho, in my opinion the bright star among the three, is never anything but the thing he is at the moment pretending to be.

When I tell people I'm a comedian they say, 'Oh, are you funny?' I say, 'No, it's not that kind of comedy.'

Comedy has always been more challenging for me than drama.

I always felt that my way into comedy would be through my writing rather than my acting.

I've been doing a lot of drama, but I feel like comedy is my strength.

Comedy is not funny. Comedy is hard work and timing and lots and lots of rehearsals.

I definitely am a performer, and there are different styles of stand-up; I mean, some people are writers and they get onstage to get jokes out, and that's definitely not what I do. I like to just go up and, if I'm telling a story about someone, I'll play his or her part.

My portrayal of Fagin was all to do with my experience in comedy and revue.

I loved Peter Sellers. I thought he was the perfect mix of physical comedy with out-of-the-box humor. I loved his tone; I loved his physicality; I loved everything about what he was doing as a comedic actor.