Comedic Freedom Quotes

If something is very, very funny but possibly controversial, if it's truly funny, then it's worth doing. Things aren't worth doing for the sake of being controversial.

I didn't think that anything is beyond humor - not profane humor, but a good, honest approach to humor.

As a comedian, I am obligated to tell you the truth, my truth. To share with you my beliefs, my perspective. And I think that we forget sometimes that that's the oath that comics take, that we will go up and share everything - the irreverent, the scary.

It was sort of the first movie [The Specials ] where I really got to let my comedy freak flag fly. And everybody in it made me laugh really hard. I wish more people had seen it.

I'll go back to comedy clubs when they get a real no-camera policy, the same way they did with smoking.

What's funny is funny. It doesn't matter what expense it's at. There are people who don't like that and I understand.

Girls are supposed to be feminine and demure. Comedy isn't about that, so you just have to unlearn it. Certain women are so pretty, they can't go weird enough to be funny. You have to be willing to be ugly. I'm lucky my face can look so hideous.

The beauty of comedy is you can really push things. Hopefully, you're with people with a sense of humor and can relate to it.

I don't feel those limits when I'm on stage. For some reason, audiences let me get away with things. Remember, it's all comedy. Words. Thoughts. All thoughts are safe and worth exploring.

'Gob' is a character that I enjoy playing immensely because I have so much freedom to take his dim-wittedness to all sorts of low levels. I find him interesting because when you see real people who are completely self-unaware, it boggles your mind.

At some point in the past, it was decided that women in comedy are never supposed to be shown in an unflattering light. But in comedy, you need all of your tools to be funny.

I'm a nightclub comic. That's what I do. I work in the clubs uncensored because my mind is uncensored, and those are the thoughts that I have. I do the kind of comedy that I would enjoy seeing.

You can't make everybody laugh. You gotta just do what you think is funny. Just be obstreperous to everybody.

There's a general sense that women are more relaxed and less defensive in comedy than they used to be. I think it's easier than it was but underlying it all there is still a pretty sexist view of women on stage, which to me hasn't changed that much.

Stand-up is the place where you can do things that you could never do in public. Once you step on stage you're licensed to do that. It's an understood relationship. You walk on stage - it's your job.

My thinking is, if we're setting out to make comedy in which nothing is off limits, then everybody is fair game.

I've said jokes where I thought people might get up and hit me for this. A couple of people have thought about it. But they didn't. It gives you a lot of power, because if you're on shows where people are worried about getting sacked and you're not, then you're transcendent because you say what other people would like to say.

I have no line. If I think it's funny, it's funny.

With stand-up, you can be as freeform as you want to be. You can say what you want, how you want, at any moment without constraint.

When political correctness first started coming around, it ruined Andrew Dice Clay and Eddie Murphy's stand-up career. Sam Kinison died at just the right time, 'cause no one was going to tolerate what he was saying anymore either.

As long as it's not an easy, outdated stereotype and it comes from an interesting or emotionally driven place, then anyone can be made fun of.

My monologues aren't always funny. They're generally thoughtful. Sometimes at different levels of aggravation. And sometimes no aggravation. But the pressure on me is not to be joke-efficient when I'm talking on this mic. And that sets the tone.

I'm sure when alternative comedy started, before which - Billy Connolly aside - standup was essentially a person being racist and sexist onstage, there was also the sense that this was the death of comedy. But it's just progress.

My act is so completely and totally uncensored that the only way I could really pull it off is if I treat the audience like they're my best friends.

My whole intention is to break down these limitations of what a black comedian is supposed to be and to open up a space.