Allan Carr Quotes

I got into standup because I wanted to be an actor, and then I ended up loving standup for the next eleven years.

I've been performing on stage since I was six years old.

I think I probably would have gone into stand-up.

I've been doing stand-up since I was 19. There have been times I've had to step away because of my schedule, but now I'm able to go out and do theaters and not smoky little bars.

Standup led me to acting because I liked standup, and I saw people on a stage, and the closest, nearest thing to me was doing plays. It was like, that's the same thing as standup - people are on a stage; they're being seen and saying things - so, because of my love of standup, I moved towards acting.

I started performing non-professionally at birthday parties and family gatherings doing 'Saturday Night Live' impressions at four. Then I started for real at seven.

I'd been doing standup since college.

I can work as a writer, but I wanted to do stand-up.

I went to drama school and, after that, went to Paris to train at a place called Ecole Philippe Gaulier. When I came home, I realised I'd have to have a serious stab at it. I didn't have an agent and didn't have the traditional drama school showcase, so I started a comedy group with a couple of friends.

I started stand-up in 2007. I'd done a couple of gigs before that, but not much, and I was in a sketch group at Uni from 2005 as well.

Little did I know that earning a living at stand-up is the hardest thing you can do. But once I started doing it, I just loved it, and I realized that I was actually kinda good at it, and then that was it.

I got into stand-up to get on a sitcom.

The first time I ever did a play, in junior high school, I said to myself, 'Hey, people like me doing this. I'm making them laugh.'

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.

A friend of mine had his own theater company, and he jumped me in like I was in a gang. And once I came in, it was just that simple. For the first time in my life, I felt, 'This is a career, this is a life that I think I can grow old doing.' It was love at first sight. I loved being on stage and reading these plays. It was great.

I tend to a lot of improvisational ranting, and that's fun. For me, stand-up has been, performance-wise, a really good outlet.

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.

I always want to go back and do stand-up; I like the freedom.

I love stage actors. There's something special about all people who have to do a performance eight shows a week, and musical people, especially, are so much fun.

I started in improv and went into different kinds of things.

I did, like, one or two plays in high school, but I don't think I realized I wanted to do comedy until I got to college, and I started doing improv and saw the Upright Citizens Brigade perform and did workshops with them.

Stand-up was my entree into the entertainment world. I didn't have to act out somebody else's words. I could just stand there with a microphone, and nobody would interrupt me. It's the most narcissistic thing you could probably do.

I knew at an early age that I wanted to pursue comedy.

After my first play, I realised that comedy was my forte - rather than being a dukhi heroine, I would rather do comedy.

I started doing stand-up when I was 15 and doing Letterman when I was 20. So I've been doing stand-up comedy and clubs for over 30 years. That's a long time.