Steve Harvey Quotes

People either have comedy or they don't. You can't teach it to them.

I think if I have any kind of unique gift, it's more in the comedy area than it is in the dramatic area.

I don't think you can teach people how to be funny. You can make suggestions about how to speak a line or get a laugh, but it has to be in them.

Music was the first thing I did where I was naturally talented.

A fellow who has a funny bone can learn to hone his skills, but I don't think you can develop a funny bone - you either have it or you don't. And by the way - when you get it, we don't know it.

You can't make a star - they just have it.

I always felt that it was easier to take a funny person and teach them to write television than to take somebody who was a television writer and make them funny.

Comedy, I figured, was the thing that came to me the most easily. Playing the trumpet and piano took practice. I thought that was a waste of time. I'd go out on the street corner and be funny. In a minute.

I will say from the outset, I think if you're great, you're great from the very beginning. And because I do think it is innate and I do think it is a gift you just have, and I don't think you can - you can hone the skills of a director, but sadly, I do think that you are born a great director. I think it's just in you and it's something that is deep in you. But, I find it can be difficult working with first-time directors, but it's also moving.

Comic timing is something you are either born with or do not have.

My first lessons in comedy, how to construct a joke, I learned from Eileen Brennan, who had unbelievable timing.

Neither instinct nor style ..can be bought or taught.

I think I rely on my talent more than my brain sometimes.

It came naturally to find out what I did best, which was to write songs and sing well.

In my career spanning over two decades, I've never felt that comedy is a department everybody can excel in because it's an art and only a few are blessed with the talent to entertain.

I have a lot of respect for actors who do comedy. They do it naturally.

People who want to be singers can be nurtured and taught, and they can make great strides. But, the truth is, if you are completely tone deaf, it is never going to happen for you. It's just a reality of life. It's like me thinking I can be an Olympic swimmer. It ain't gonna happen!

A man is born an artist as a hippopotamus is born a hippopotamus; and you can no more make yourself one than you can make yourself a giraffe.

Actors are not made, they are born.

You can improve your talent, but your talent is a given, a mysterious constant. You must make it the best of its kind.

A natural talent is required; for, when Nature opposes, everything else is in vain; but when Nature leads the way to what is most excellent, instruction in the art takes place, which the student must try to appropriate to himself by reflection, becoming an early pupil in a place well adapted for instruction. He must also bring to the task a love of labor and perseverance, so that the instruction taking root may bring forth proper and abundant fruits.

Comedy is actually very hard. It's hard to choose those moments and know when you can really push it, and know when you should be bringing it back and making it more subtle, and knowing as time goes on, as you do take after take and the crowd around you stops laughing. Whenever you do comedy, you realize you're up against - you're performing next to people who you would think are so unbelievably good at it, that that's a bit of a pressure. But at the same time, it's just fun. It's fun to be able to let out that side of you.

You have to have a talent for having talent.

My gift was in comedy. I found out I could make jokes. I could tell jokes. I could write them. So over the years, that's what I've done.

Everyone is born with some special talent.