Steve Buscemi Quotes

Regardless of what I do, whether I write a book or whether I act or whether I host, I'll always do stand-up comedy because those moments, that's what I crave. If I do something funny, and I hear a crowd laugh in that moment, we're all sharing the exact same experience and the exact same feeling.

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.

The only way to stay sharp is to do live shows. There is no part-time comedy.

Stand-up is not something that you're good at right away. You have to do it a ton. But, I think I got to shave a year off because I didn't have to get over stage fright.

One place that I really feel comfortable is being a comedienne. I'm very socially inept. There's so many things that I can not do in life, and this is, like, the one thing that I have mastery over. It's my world. And anybody who's coming to the show, it's like they're coming because they know that this is my world.

Life experience is not something to be denied, but to be celebrated.

I would be an actress for the rest of my life just because it's really relaxing. Writing is hard work, and stand-up is so stressful before you get on stage, but acting is a complete ensemble experience.

Stand-up, for me, is really more of an addiction, so you have to feed the beast whenever you can.

The more life experience you have, the more comedy you can write.

As a comedian, you're kind of like a blues musician; you have to live a little bit.

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.

Being on 'Whitney' is a job, but stand-up is my life. I could never stop. There's an art to it. I love having strangers laugh with me, so as long as I can continue doing that, I'll be happy. Working on a show and collectively sharing ideas with a cast is great, but stand-up is my first love.

I will always do stand-up, even if my acting career takes off. Stand-up is my life.

The ability to workshop in stand-up comedy is incomparable to any art form, in my opinion.

Beyond any role that I ever had, really early on as a stand-up, I would see actors decide to try it and they would bomb miserably. What I realized was that stand-up, acting and writing are all their own disciplines.

No matter what you're going through, as long as you have some specific emotion, whether it's positive or negative, it is all stuff that you can use on stage.

Also, as I've gotten older and more mature, I've become much more comfortable in my own skin. After 25 years of doing stand-up, that's reflected onstage.

I prefer being known for my stand-up because I write it. I love being an actor, and saying other people's words is great. But then, when I do stand-up, I love getting my own point of view out there.

I remember when I was 33 or 34, it was devastating because I realized I wasn't a kid anymore. The great thing about 40 was that I really felt like I had life experience and knew what I was doing now.

The success of any stand-up act comes out of life experience.

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

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.

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 would love to do more TV and do movies for the experience, but my ultimate focus is stand-up. It's the number one thing that I love most because there is nothing like being with a live audience.