Jacques Torres Quotes

On stage I try to be as spontaneous as possible, feeding off the energy of the audience. I just let myself be and have fun on stage.

A live performance is the same no matter what genre it is. Wrestling, rock 'n roll, hosting, acting - it's the same thing.

I really love live performing!

I began to work the stage and get the audience into it. I also learned how to have fun out there. It is something I will never forget.

Cyndi Lauper knows how to work a crowd.

There's some anxiety the 30 minutes before the show starts. But once you step on stage and face the people, everything goes away, and you have fun and enjoy the audience.

I never look at a note. I just roam the stage. The people do not want to leave.

Honestly, live is my favorite way of performing. Every show is a completely different energy.

I get such joy out of performing for people, and you can tell whether they like you or they don't like you the minute you walk out on the stage. And they don't even have to tell me that they had a good time. I know they had a good time.

Doing my Broadway show '700 Sundays' reminded me how much I love working in front of an audience.

I love the stage - the fact that you only have one take to get it right, the interaction with the audience, and how every show is different even though you're doing the same thing.

For me, every time I step on the stage it feels like a battle is about to start. It's not like we're going on stage to fight against our audience obviously, because for me, when I go on stage, I'm always trying to reach a new level of how am I going to make today a great night for everyone that's present.

Some guys like myself, we like to play off the crowd.

Every time I see a live performance of something, I'm like, 'I want to be doing that!'

I think generally playing live is a crap idea. So much of stage work is the presentation of personality, and I've never been interested in that.

You have to be ready to sing and perform at any time.

People buy a ticket to see your show, so from the moment I get onstage, I can have no insecurities, because they're already there. You have to get people to listen. If they listen, everything's cool.

Just me onstage with a mike having an intimate relationship with the audience. I don't get nervous for that. I just get excited.

Something that I think I figured out slowly was if you're playing a show and there's a chatter or there is, you know, a lot of noise - people talking or something - I was never the one whose instinct was to try to be louder than them.

From then on, I realized this is what I want to do, what I'm supposed to do: Giving energy and receiving it back through applause. I love it. That's my world. I love it. I enjoy it. I live for it.

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

The best shows I play, I almost don't even remember off the stage.

I think a theater show is a pure version of me doing my material. The theater crowd is a bit more polite, there really aren't hecklers, and there are a lot of people there to see me, and they're excited about the jokes and hanging out with me for a show.

I don't really like doing big stand-up. Whenever I do theaters, I don't like 'em. I don't think they're right for stand-up. I've seen people in theaters, and it just doesn't work, because you're talking to the guy next to you the whole time.

Comedians sometimes forget that there's an audience. You gotta be conscious that you're performing for other human beings.