John Mulaney Quotes

I'm a take-no-prisoners type of comic, and I'm lucky because my fans get me and never have a problem with the politically incorrect themes of my act. But I am continually amazed by how a certain section of our society seems to be so freakin' sensitive about jokes.

Adam Carolla is like Hitler if Hitler wasn’t funny.

Well, I'm not afraid to say something if I think it's funny, even if it's harsh or racist.

Who's to say where funny stops and 'too far' starts?

It's much easier to make jokes about sensitive issues if there is some dissent, some conflict.

My thinking is, if we're setting out to make comedy in which nothing is off limits, then everybody is fair game.

With anything you put out there, you're going to offend somebody, but most people get that it's a joke, that I'm playing a character, and that I'm actually making fun of what I'm saying by saying it.

I think comedy has to be very fearless, or it just gets bland.

Bad taste is not illegal. I always got my first laughs as a kid by saying inappropriate things. That's always how we're going to get our laughs as comics.

We never really tried to shock for shock's sake on 'Family Guy'. If something was horribly offensive and shocking, we would put it in if it was also hysterically funny.

Do you want me to apologize after every joke? If it doesn't offend somebody it's probably not a joke. It's probably an observation that's not funny. It's gotta offend somebody somewhere.

I'm not hurting anybody. Comedy's all about innuendo. I'm putting it out there just like anybody else.

I think humor is such a personal thing, and you put a microphone in somebody's face, they're going to say something that offends somebody.

I think the people that most often cross a line are comedians. I think they relish that, and take pride in that on some level - at least, from what little I've seen and understand about people that do stand-up.

I need my comedy to offend. That's my personal views.

I don't really see the point in offensive comedy.

I've made a lot of crazy comedy videos and said a lot of crazy things. If it's too offensive, I apologize and move on, but I do comedy.

I don't look at comedy as a sliding scale of offensiveness.

I've gotten in trouble with every race you can imagine. They say, 'I can't believe you talked about this - you're racist.' And I say, 'How can I be racist? Isn't racism exclusionary? If all of you are offended, that means I'm including every race in my jokes.'

I think you can safely joke about anything. Mostly.

Sometimes my humor does offend people, and I've said it before: I don't write jokes to be offensive. I write jokes to be funny, and I guess what I find funny are things that other people sometimes find offensive. I would love nothing more than to never offend anyone, but it just doesn't seem to work out that way.

Now, some people do this for shock value. Shock is just another uptown word for surprise. Granted it has a different quality to it, but a joke is about surprising someone. I'm a great believer in context. You can joke about anything. I do like finding out where the line is drawn, deliberately crossing it and bringing some of them with me across the line, and having them be happy that I did.

I'm not for gratuitous nudity, but if there's humor, I don't have a problem.

Some people can do things and get away with it. Comics are famously like that. Why is it that some guys can say the most horrible things and it's not offensive, it's funny?

Just because I do a few comedy bits about gay people, that does not mean I'm out there promoting some anti-gay cause.