Samuel L. Jackson Quotes

In the entertainment industry all that anybody wants to do whether it's music or stories or dancing or comedy or whatever, they want to entertain the public. And they do it any way they can. Sometimes they concentrate simply on entertaining people and they don't care what message they are giving.

I never called my work an 'art'. It's part of show business, the business of building entertainment.

I believe in the nobility of entertaining people and I take great, great pride that people are willing to give me two or three hours of their busy lives.

I love to talk about people I've met being an entertainer. All my encounters in life - I roll it all into an hour and 30 minutes.

[On being an actor] .nothing more than a worker in a service occupation . It's like being a waiter or a gas station attendant, but I'm waiting on 6 million people in a week if I'm lucky.

The old forms of entertainment are not extinct. Live performances are the pinnacle. If you can something that people want to see live, then you have a great career.

I'm out there every night working my butt off trying to do what I do, and that is entertain every single person that paid their hard earned money for a ticket. So I think people realize that and I think over time, I feel like that's grown, definitely.

My father was an entertainer, and he knew what he was doing.

Sometimes, you know how good certain people are and then you actually get to see them have the kind of matches you know they can have in front of an audience that isn't used to seeing that. Then, in a few minutes the audience is on the edge of their seats, just through the sheer craftsmanship of their abilities.

The truth is, a lot of people go to drag shows, really, for very light entertainment, and I think sometimes maybe we don't even give the audiences enough credit as to what they'd be down for.

Taking off my shirt has become a part of my life, whether it is at award ceremonies or reality shows. As long as people enjoy it, why not?

We're in the entertainment business. As much as people would like to say it's sport, it's definitely entertainment.

I just try to do things on stage that I think the audience would enjoy. And I try to draw on and add to acts that I've enjoyed watching.

People pay a lot of money to go see shows now, they don't wanna know about your technical problems, or if you're not feeling good, they don't wanna know we have a glitch. It's their night, you better do something to earn that money.

I like entertaining people. I like being on stage. I like being in the life. This is what I do. This is the only thing I know how to do besides rob people and fight. Even when I was robbing people, I was entertaining them. But that's just what I love doing.

People come out to see you perform and you've got to give them the best you have within you.

If people have the ability to see it, and you spend the money to put the wow factor into it, they will reward that entity or that team or that business, and they will then say they appreciate me, they appreciate what I'm about, and they will support it.

I feel like you've gotta be able to get up every night in front of a live audience. Whether it's 10 people or 50 people or a hundred people, whether you're in a rock band or doing the comedy circuit.

I can stand at the back of the theater and watch an audience laugh, cry, and be moved by what I do. I can entertain people around the world. It's nice when you can give someone that gift.

Your only guidepost is your own instinct and judicious editing. In my stand-up act I learned that in the first 10 minutes I could say anything and it would get a laugh. Then I'd better deliver. In the movie it's the same thing. You get a lot of laughs when people first sit down and then the story better kick in. Many years in front of an audience, I would hope, give me a sense of what works.

Every time I go out on a stage I consider myself very lucky. Because, in a time where people are economically thinking about what to go and see - so, when I am on a stage, and it doesn't matter where I am, that's my favorite show. I come home after and say "That was my favorite show".

We are in the same tent as the clowns and the freaks - that's show business.

With TV, the most important thing is just to get people to turn it on.

I liked doing live things, and with the Circus we had a live audience.

Whether it's five people or 50,000 people, I always love to perform and feel very blessed that I'm able to do that.