Billy Gardell Quotes

That's the great thing about New Year's, you get to be a year older. For me, that wasn't such a joke, because my birthday was always around this time. When I was a kid, my father used to tell me that everybody was celebrating my birthday. That's what the trees are all about.

I'm a comedian first. I've learned how to act. I just draw on life experiences and that's how I've learned. I didn't take classes or anything. I don't need no classroom.

My greatest hope was to get discovered as a comedian and get on a sitcom.

Stand-up is my baby.

I used to go to the Cleveland Comedy Club all the time. If there was a comic I liked, I'd go see him two or three times that week. Bob Saget was one of those guys.

Stand-up comedy is the most relaxing thing I do. If I want to unwind and de-stress, I go out and do stand-up, often several shows in a night.

When I first started doing comedy years ago, I used to be the biggest Michael Richards fan. I used to love this dude. He was on a TV show called 'Fridays,' and man, he was tall and lanky - and I was tall and lanky. I love physical comedy, and he was a physical comedian, and I said, 'Man, I love this guy.'

I did stand-up for a good number of years while I was still living in New York, and those people primarily knew me as 'the kid stand-up.'

You know, stand-up comedy is where I pretty much started out.

The most frightening thing about playing Dick Gregory is I've never done stand-up before, and I had to learn how to be a stand-up comedian, which was a bit of a challenge.

I started working full time as a comedian in 2005, shortly after we did the Vince Vaughn 'Wild West Comedy Show.' I worked at the Four Seasons hotel from 1998 to 2005, so about seven years, just trying to put some food on the table and pay the rent while I went out to the open mics and got my feet wet with stand-up comedy.

I am a comedian: that means I laugh at things other people don't laugh at and also annoys my wife sometimes.

Sometimes in stand-up, you want that late-night set where you get that five minutes, then you want a half-hour special, and then the crown, if you will, is an HBO special.

Certainly, when I left New Zealand, there was no career there as a comedian. I was doing more live gigs than anyone, and I was maybe doing three a week. Even then, it would often be the same people in the audience, going, 'I saw you on Tuesday, mate!'

There's [John Mulaney Show] jokes that I have in stand up that I wouldn't try to put in, I would try to have someone just speak extemporaneously in the middle of a scene about an episode of "Law and Order" or something.

If you call me a comedian I will be very grateful. I will thank you profoundly. No, I love doing comedy. It's fun once in a while to do a serious part but I really enjoy doing comedy because I love to laugh.

I never go see live comedy shows because I just sit in the audience thinking, "Here's what I would say. Here's what I would do if I got up there." It drives me crazy.

I considered myself a professional comedian because the club would pay me $20.

I'm not a comedian. I'm Lenny Bruce.

I always wanted to be a comedian and actor. I basically stumbled into the music medium, though. I'm OK, but that's about it. I like to think I'm good enough not to negatively affect the performance.

I am a comedian and you guys know whatever I say, I don't mean any of it.

It's a lot easier to say you're a comic than a performance artist.

If I get big laughs, I'm a comedian. If I get little laughs, I'm a humorist. If I get no laughs, I'm a singer.

A comedian who starts talking to himself becomes his own audience. This is fatal.

If I'm not on tour, I can run down to the comedy club and do a little stand-up. If you're an actor, you can't go - I guess there's forms of it.