Jeff Baena Quotes

When I write, I create really absurd situations which become false because I am after the joke.

Comedy is created when someone is trying very earnestly to do what he feels is the right thing to do at that moment.

If a song is funny and absurd, and it sounds great, it's just going to be that much funnier. And there's no better example of that than 'Monty Python.'

Silences are the most underrated part of comedy.

Every time I do something silly, it comes off really funny because it's natural.

I think a lot of humor is about distracting yourself. Pretend you're not trying to make it funny. Because for some reason the effort to be funny smells like sulphur in our culture.

I've always enjoyed watching characters that aren't aware that they're doing anything funny. And I think that inherently makes them funnier.

You can't do anything to be funny. That's cringeworthy. If your humor comes out of a place of love every time, you don't make the joke bigger than you. The funniest comedians are in touch with their emotional level.

Especially when you deal with comedy, you have got to be really honest because it's the honesty and the spontaneity that causes people to chuckle, that catches people.

Comedy is unusual people in real situations; farce is real people in unusual situations.

When I'm playing comedy, I never do 'jokes.' Sometimes I'll deliver a line in a way I think is more likely to get a laugh, but all the best comedy is played straight. What's funny is the way it hits the world around it or the way it hits the other characters.

I definitely prefer working in comedy over drama, but at the same time, when it comes to comedy, I tend to prefer comedies that have a great sense of truth to them and that come from an honest place.

Funny is when you're serious.

That word 'funny' always makes me feel uncomfortable. Because if I were trying to be funny, I would be something like Bill Wegman - he really tries to be funny. I don't try to be funny. It's just that I feel the world is a little bit absurd and off-kilter, and I'm sort of reporting.

Some comedies, they want you falling on your face and doing silly things.

Comedy is all about the pause.

If you're contriving something, if you're making something up, it's not funny. You can tell. It's instant. It has to come from someplace real.

Nothing is off-limits. There's just some things I cannot crack. Politics I can't do. When I start to talk about it, I just get really angry and super sincere. I have never found a way to craft all of that absurdity into funny.

You can't fake comedy. You can't make it look beautiful or put an interesting bit of music on in the background: funny can only be funny if you're funny.

Jesse has opened for me extensively on the road so I’ve seen him do hundreds of sets. He is always super funny, has tons of material and the crowds love him. Bottom line, Jesse Joyce is a great comedian.

My notion of a great novel is something like a five-hundred-page shaggy-dog story, with only the punch line omitted.

I love watching people be totally committed in a very real way to stupid situations. I find it's not so much trying to be funny, it's trying to be real in a messed up context. That's comedy to me.

Comedy's easy for me now - it's all about timing and the way you deliver lines. I use facial expressions to get the point across.

I love the way Damon Lindelof writes. It's almost like he was channeling me and he had my voice, even though the territory that those lines cover is unpredictable, and goes from raw emotion to laugh out loud funny but always true.

You can't just play crazy. It makes you push yourself to stay in the realm of reality. And when you do that, it's a lot funnier. That's my favorite, when you think it's a real strange person and not just someone being wacky.