Paul Merton Quotes

Improv relies just as much on listening as it does you delivering dialogue. That's the hard for some people. Some people just concentrate on what they're going to say, and they're not listening. You have to listen in order to see where the other person is going to.

With improv, it's a combination of listening and not trying to be funny.

I'm convinced to do improv. All you have to do is listen to what people are saying to you, and then just add more information to what they've just said. That's all there is to improv, but it's the hardest thing to do.

The lifelong goal of an improviser is to listen to what the other person is saying, taking it in, and responding.

Acting is about listening, and that's something that took me awhile. You almost don't have to learn your lines, if you listen to what they're saying and move it along.

If you don't get feedback from your performers and your audience, you're going to be working in a vacuum.

I've never had a plan - it was just to try and get with the people you like to play with, and try to do the best you can.

I come from a background where I like collaboration and improv. I think that it is important.

But I just think we've got such a continuity with what we're doing that most people come in and fill in the blanks. And sometimes we leave a lot of blanks to be filled.

I love to be in the position of not knowing what I'm gonna do, but having rehearsed all of those so when something happens with the others actors I go with whatever that is I'm getting.

It's such a great thing to work with people and not have a plan.

The big secret in acting is listening to people.

Unfortunately, when you're an actor you have to act. It's not like you can sit in your living room, your bedroom, your study or whatever and act with yourself. It requires having somebody to respond to.

I never try and do the same show, ever. The audience controls the dynamic of the shows. Sometimes they listen, and sometimes they ask a million questions.

I think teams really want to see how you respond picking up and grasping things and if you can make changes and regurgitate that information.

For me, you have to do as much work as you can beforehand and, once you get on stage or set, throw it out the window because you need to be collaborative. You shouldn't have too many ideas about where it goes before you get into the room with the director and other actors.

I love talking to people, and I'll listen to what they have to say, and if they have ideas or something like that, I'll put you to work.

I like all kinds of input.

When you are doing comedy, you need to get the right reaction from your partner.

...The key to playing with any group is you listen all the time and you listen more than you play.

The eagerness of a listener quickens the tongue of a narrator.

You can't do what you've been asked to do unless you do the best you can. And roughly speaking, the best you can do is to be very available as a character and actor to the people you're acting with. That's equally important, whether the camera's on the other person or on you.

Much of what you do as an actor - it's who's around you, what's the environment, where do you fit into this thing. That's really work that's impossible to do on your own, at least for me. I find it hard to pre-plan every element of everything I do. It's not my thing.

When I started out as an actor, I thought, Here's what I have to say; how shall I say it? I began to understand that what I do in the scene is not as important as what happens between me and the other person. And listening is what lets it happen. It's almost always the other person who causes you to say what you say next. You don't have to figure out how you'll say it. You have to listen so simply, so innocently, that the other person brings about a change in you that makes you say it and informs the way you say it.

Communication is the key, and it's one thing I had to learn-to talk to the actors. I was so involved with the visual and technical aspects that I would forget about the actors.