Jim Gaffigan Quotes

One of the things that's funniest about the entertainment industry and comedy is that people go 'Oh, you're great, but I don't know what to do with you.' The great thing about the Internet is that nobody has to figure out what to do with you. You can figure out what to do with you, and you can say, 'I made this thing, and I'm going to put it out, and now if people want to come see me and buy things from me they can.'

Most actors have to sit by the phone and wait for somebody to call them up to audition and stuff. I don't think I can exist in Hollywood just on that. I think I need to be proactive and making sure that things I really want to do are being developed to the point where somebody wants to make them?

Hollywood is all about making an entrance. I don't want to be a walking advertisement for anyone other than myself.

The problem with making movies is that you have to devote so much of your life to fawning and flattering the men in suits, whereas that doesn't happen in books. You just go and write, and then the book comes out.

The thing about TV is it's a meritocracy. I love that aspect of it - and I've had shows that have gone on the air and been canceled. I've seen the good and the bad of it.

Persistence is a pretty important part of making it in this business, which, in retrospect, is the easy part. Maintaining a profile is the difficult part of the job. Somehow or another, I muddled through that system and somehow am around to still enjoy playing for people.

I kinda like the idea of having an album that's all me.

I mean, the title of my show is my name. That's not because I was an established voice. It's because of a rising number of outlets, and an increased willingness to take risks. All the sudden, people like me are finding themselves in the position to make things.

I'm building my own brand outside of the Peas. It's not Black Eyed Peas, it's Zumbao. Zumbao is different from the Peas because it's all on me and I can't feed off of anybody other than me.

I was like, 'I have to start writing for myself, to show people what I can do and what my point of view is.'

Aziz Ansari was on 'Parks and Recreation' for, I don't know, what, seven years? And he was a really popular stand-up comedian. He even says that his Netflix show wouldn't have gotten made unless he created it himself. No one was probably willing to put someone like Aziz as the lead in a show until he actually created it himself.

As a writer for six years, I wrote my own TV, which, I was the only person in the WWE that could probably honestly say, since day one in NXT, they wrote their own material.

I always knew that content was the best way to sell things, but my thing was, why sell other people's stuff if I have a point of view?

I don't think you should sit around and wait for people to give you an opportunity to express yourself or do your work, or whatever. Actors have to be producers and writers have to be producers.

All I've ever wanted to do is entertain people - make them laugh, think, smile, feel creeped out or scared; whatever it is. I'm getting the opportunity to do that in various roles.

In other words, when you have someone [like Ridley Scott] with that authority, then you tend to be left alone. But they were good and they're really good people, and I'm a big champion of the BBC and I think that like minds find each other and I think that FX and BBC is a perfect match.

It’s literally true, as Shakespeare said--all the world’s a stage. It wasn’t that way when I first got into the movies in 1924, but it is now. That’s why I find Hollywood newer and more exciting every day. Whatever you hear it’s still a place where a kid from Montana can jump on a horse, ride that-a-way, and keep right on going.

I'm going to eventually shoot my own special, because you have to own your own content. My Turn (2003), that's never been released on DVD.

As we speak, that is what we are doing. Projects that come to you are not written for you. We have to take a lesson from Will Smith, who develops projects he can shine in. We're trying to develop things from the ground up.

The Hollywood I know has allowed me the opportunity after opportunity to keep doing new things and not send me out to pasture. I don't want to go to pasture. It's cold. I'm allergic to grass. And the cows are mean.

Sometimes, we have to promote ourselves. Just go out and be very active about trying to find an opportunity.

I don't like to hear anybody in show business complain, because I just find it to be such a grateful business. Because there are so many wonderful, creative souls out there and there are so few jobs. And, so, I just find myself thinking to myself "wow, if I could get into a show of any kind and have it last for a while" - that's when I find myself really happy.

They think America is like a major league in entertainment. For me personally being here for the past year-and-a-half, I know some of the arguments and discrepancies African American actors have with the opportunities here.

I think I came along at an opportune time. I don't know if that would happen anymore, because the whole way of doing business in Hollywood has changed.

The way that I make films is that I sit down and I think, "How much money could I get with less consequences?" And that's how I start. I'd rather have less money and total autonomy than more money and start having to answer to things, because then I'm not being true and the money men are not being true.