Comedic Truth Quotes

Big comedy is good, I like things that are big, but good comedy has to be truthful I think and has to reflect some sort of reality.

I'm not playing a comedy. I want to be playing the truth of the moment, and then have the comedy come out.

The only honest art form is laughter, comedy. You can't fake it.

There is no credit to being a comedian, when you have the whole Government working for you. All you have to do is report the facts. I dont even have to exaggerate.

And you know, whether it's drama or comedy, the best work is based on truth. It's just that, with comedy, the circumstances are just crazy-heightened, and you have these crazy things thrown at you. But you still have to do it truthfully, because that's where the humor comes from. So it's not that difficult to cross over.

I think there's a responsibility more as an artist to try and push in the direction you think comedy should go... The biggest thing I could do for the art that I love was keeping it art: keeping it special, keeping it honest, keeping it truthful.

Of course, my whole theory of comedy is based in reality. The funniest stuff comes from real life.

You can't deny the truth. And that's what makes smart comedy so good.

The real heart of comedy is uncovering a truth about yourself or about the world that you didn't see.

Real comedy can't be learned; it comes from a need for justice. The best who stand up, stand up for something.

With comedy, you have to do it right. In a drama, there's a lot of different ways to succeed in a moment. But comedy comes from reality. You can't try to be funny.

How can there be inaccuracy in comedy?

To be a comic, you must reveal yourself in your most grotesque nudity. And it's only then, when the truth gets told, when the audience recognizes it somewhere in themselves, that they get that great medicine of laughter.

What reaches an audience is honesty. If you're saying something truthful that's supposed to be a funny line, it's going to be funny. And if it's supposed to be a serious line, it's going to be serious. But, I don't think there's a distinction between how you play drama or comedy, if it's based in the truth.

The best comedy to me - and again, I grew up with comedy since I was a baby, so I've seen it all - is when you exaggerate the truth, like Richard Pryor did, you understand?

In my mind, if you write a comedy where human beings experience pain, you're just being realistic.

Being funny should be an incidental byproduct of trying to get to something truthful, not a destination in itself.

The difficulty with humorists is that they will mix what they believe with what they don't; whichever seems likelier to win an effect.