John Mulaney Quotes

Having to stand in front of an audience and have it be your job to make them laugh, you can't really look to anyone but yourself. It's what you wrote, what you said and how you said it, so it's kind of terrifying, but I liked it. When it goes well, it's the best feeling in the world. When it doesn't go well, it's the worst feeling, but once you get into the rhythm of it, I think it's really fun.

It's depressing sitting at a comedy club all night, waiting to get on to do your five or ten minutes of material.

My first open mic, I drank a full pitcher of beer by myself. I wasn't afraid of being in front of people as much as, Is this funny?

It's hard to get laughs when you're new.

At some point I stopped stand-up because I didn't have something to say on a nightly basis.

I remember thinking as I was doing the jokes for the first time, "If I can hear that very clearly, I'm not hearing laughter." It just became deafening, this buzzing noise. I mean, it was brutal. It was really terrible. Then I remember thinking, "At least nobody important, or anyone who I really respect, saw that." And then literally right when I went off the stage, Jerry Seinfeld got up and went on. So I was like, "Oh great. Seinfeld saw me bomb." On the other hand, I thought, "At least no one will be thinking of me anymore. They'll just be focusing on him."

By the way, to perform in front of Don Rickles, it 's not nerve-wrecking. It 's enjoyable, i am enjoying Jeff Garlin. I hope I perform in front of Don Rickles every night of my life !

When you go out there to do comedy, you feel like you're doing battle with the audience a lot of the time. You're either going to get 'em, or you're not.

You say a line and you wait for them to laugh, then you say another line and you wait... It felt weird to me. But it's interesting and the energy is almost like theatre, I suppose, with all the people there.

When you're doing stand-up, you can comment if something fails, get a laugh from that.

You're in front of an audience, but you're playing for a camera. There's this huge adrenaline rush, because you know that besides the audience in the studio, there are millions of people watching at home.

When you're a stand-up, you play in front of 600 people, and it's all about timing. I could never do stand-up comedy; it would be way too hard for me.

I used to do a lot of comedy. I don't know what happened. I think it's my face.

There are lines that I know are going to get a belly laugh, but after a few shows I get sick of hearing myself say them so I drop them.

The night I won at the Apollo, I was only doing it for the $10.

There's an audience that is paid to laugh at my jokes. I'm playing a character while I'm doing stand-up. Real stand-ups, man, they're playing themselves. I'd be far too terrified.

In standup, the feedback is instantaneous, and if it fails, you know you'll be off-stage and hiding in a short time.

Stand up is the most stressful, and hosting and presenting a show has its own stresses, because you've got an audience which you've got to entertain as well as an audience at home.

I know what I want to talk about, but I don't really know what's funny about a joke until I perform it in front of an audience.

[sam] Kinison, when he started out, he'd come to Canada when I was first starting, and he'd always [bomb].

Stand-up is every man for himself; you learn from hanging out at these clubs and watching other guys, and then trying not to be like them.

Although I do stand-up - doing actual stage work is terrifying for me.

Ok so there's no TV shows, no movies going on fine, but I love going on stage and performing stand up so my situation is a little better than someone who's strictly just an actor or actress.

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.