Ron White Quotes

Stand-up comedy is something that you have to strive to do, multiple times a night, every night, to be good.

Bad improv happens with people who are inexperienced with each other and don't know the craft that well. But bad stand-up is something that could happen to someone at any level in their career.

It takes many years to be a great comedian.

When I began doing stand-up, it took me a long time to get an hour's worth of material together.

I love doing stand-up, and the more you do outside of stand-up to raise your profile, the better your stand-up becomes in terms of the quality of gigs.

I could never do stand-up because it's that thing of having to get up on stage. And out of every 10 jokes you tell, nine of them have to get a really good response.

I've been doing stand-up since '89.

But long story short, I didn't start doing stand-up because I wanted to have a TV show or be an actor or even wanted to write sketch comedy. I got into stand-up because I love stand-up.

I wanted to make a living, but I really was not interested in money at all. I was interested in being a great comedian.

I do love live performing, but I'm not a stand-up naturally, and I don't like the lifestyle of working just in the evenings at clubs and stuff - not a natural gig-er.

In Manhattan, I often do two or three or more shows a night, so I'm always working on new material.

Comedy is an amazing calling. Once you get that first laugh, it's hard to turn away. Then, of course, you're hooked and you have to learn how to survive in the business.

At this point, I feel fairly comfortable in terms of performance. I think having a sketch background actually helps a lot. Because my background is acting, and stand-up, in a lot of ways, is acting.

I have to visualise my jokes, live my jokes, feel the audience because every audience is different. It's like having a different dancing partner every night.

Everyone forgets comedians are actors. There's no question about it. A Robin Williams cannot say the same line every night for 40 weeks and make it sound fresh unless he's doing an acting job.

I realize as I get older that stand-up is a huge part of who I am. I think I'll do it for the rest of my life.

I always tell comics you got to hang with your stand-up.

I still love to walk on stage and make people laugh, and I work very, very hard at it, and I take it seriously.

If I'm not in the theatre, I'm in an open mic night or doing a guest set at the Comedy Club, or whatever, just trying to develop stuff.

People who want to do stand-up from the start - I mean that's an extremely self-centred thing to want, isn't it?

Impressions are still kind of hard for me and not what I love to do the most, but with characters, I think there's an element of fearlessness. You try to figure out the best reading and wording of the jokes before the show, and then you just really have to go hard.

I think I probably would have gone into stand-up.

I started comedy in 2006. I didn't even think it was a thing I could do.

The more you work in this business as a comedian, the closer you get to just being yourself onstage, on camera, the more well received you are.

As a stand-up comic, you have to do the road.