Tracy Morgan Quotes

In my stand-up, I've always been loose. If there's a curtain onstage, I'll use that in my act. If there's a door, I'll use the door. I always like to use everything at my disposal, which makes each show a little different and a little more fun.

Also I can come up with new bits - people yell stuff out and it's a new subject or a subject that I've been thinking about that I haven't done onstage yet and I'll just run with it.

A lot of my best stuff is just ad libs on stage, and that's one thing that I've gotten back to at the live show.

Believe it or not, I write on stage. I can't write anywhere else; I have to be in a moment. I also have to challenge myself to make something funny out of a premise. I never have my own jokes written. I have to change things as I go along, and I have to entertain myself.

I allow a lot of room for improvisation and funny stuff. I always feel planned.

You have to be on your game with a live audience because anything can change.

Part of being a comic is being flexible, being versatile.

A lot of guys come out, and they do the exact same thing, are in the exact same mood, and have the exact same entrance every night, I really just make up a lot of crap as I go along.

I think it's one of those things about live performance - anything goes, anything can happen, and you have to just be ready and able to roll with the punches.

When someone says to me, do you do stand-up I say absolutely not. I like to think of it as a theatrical performance. With me the show changes maybe five to ten percent every night. Of course, whatever I see in front of me and sometimes I get on a little run about it and it changes the show. And my delivery is such that people who have seen me many times say Gee, I never heard that before. Actually, they have, but I might have changed it around.

When you're on stage performing stand-up, things only happen one time. I've done bits where I improv a joke, and people are dying. The next show, I try to repeat it, I can't do it. Because with the first audience that was our moment. It can't happen the same way again. We were all there: a certain type of people were at that show and we all got it.

There are jokes I know I want to tell, and there's sort of a rough order, but usually I try to change it up every show, to improvise and talk with the audience. I think when you tell jokes, if you're not careful, you can end up telling the whole list of jokes and then that's it. And that can get a little boring.

Man, you can come see me six or seven times in a row and you'll never see the same show twice, because I don't like to be robotic onstage. I like to perform for that particular audience.

You don't always do the same things you've done the night before. That's what makes playing live so interesting as opposed to being in the studio.

When I do a take, I very often try things that I haven't planned to try to see if I can pull it off.

With a play, for me, there's no time to sit back on it. You're living on your instincts. And every night there are subtle changes and adjustments, because what's in front of you is a living, breathing audience.

The apparatus has to serve our improbability and improvisation. Being good and playing the songs is not enough.

With theatre, you have to be ready for anything.

I don't sit and write stand-up material; I come up with an idea onstage.

You must plan to be spontaneous.

The whole thing about doing TV is that you never know what's going to happen. You just have to go with it and go with the flow.

I don't do the same show on any two nights.

I can do a little bit of comedy. I can be in an in-between place, where I can do a little bit.

My whole life has been one big improvisation.

A lot of my work is a matter of reacting to surprises in life.