Comic Performance Quotes

The connection between pathos and broad comedy is very tight. But you do far more work in a comedy scene than you do in a straight scene. It's much harder.

There's obviously some appeal in scenes for me - there's something I respond to. I keep doing those films where I put myself out there like that. I guess I look for those kinds of moments and I pride myself on being an actor who will do just about anything for a laugh - so long as it's within context of the scene in the movie and it's not gratuitous. I have to feel it'll make people laugh.

Seeing a woman project the kind of aggression that you have to project as a comic just rubs me wrong.

Comedy is more difficult than drama. I think it's really difficult to make someone laugh because people have very different comedic sensibilities. In drama, you can get away with being a great actor and surrounded by great actors and having good writing. But in comedy you have to listen and you have to perform with a certain rhythm, because if you don't, it's like playing a wrong note in the orchestra and you can hear the off key and it will fall flat and you won't get that instant response.

Not necessarily in the beginning, thinking I would have a career in comedy, but I was always interested in making people laugh.

The real challenge in acting is in comedy. It's easier to get that gasp in a drama. Not easy, because you still have to find that emotional pitch. And when you do something in drama and you hear that sob from the audience it's so fulfilling. But as a comic actor, when the laugh is supposed to come and you punch in that line and nothing happens it is dreadful. It's horrific and you feel like dying right there.

I knew already when I was seven years old, that I wanted to be on stage and entertain people. I sell laughs. Here, you got one for free!

Comedy is harder than drama, because with comedy you're expecting a result..you make them laugh. [If] they ain't laughing then you're screwed.

I did try when I wasn't doing the singing to do as much comedy as I could because I thought with Comic Relief you are duty bound to anyway.

Tom Jones is funny to me, man. I mean, he really tries to ape Ray Charles and Sammy Davis, you know. He's nice-looking; he looks good doing it. I mean, if I was him, I'd do the same thing. If I was only thinking about making money.

When you're going for a joke, you're stuck out there if it doesn't work. There's nowhere to go. You've done the drum role and the cymbal clash and you're out on the end of the plank.

Doing a series of 'Facejacker' takes about nine months. It's pretty intense.

I saw Danny Kaye in a movie, and he was doing voices and faces on that big, big screen and making whole audiences laugh. It was just an instant hookup.

I don't do any jokes that old. I might have maybe one or two jokes from high school that I still do.

We've all seen comedians look like they're reaching just a little bit too much for the laugh. This is counterproductive. The conceit of standup is that it is effortless, which makes the prospect of generating new comedy a tricky one: you are trying to be funny without looking like you are trying to be funny.

Complaining that a comic is drunk is like going to a titty bar and complaining because your lapdancer is a communist.

There isn't a comedian in the world that hasn't bombed.

Comedy is the hardest thing to get right. I remember a joke we did in 'What's Up, Doc?' that didn't get a single laugh. So we moved the shot a foot-and-a-half to one side, and all of a sudden, the laugh was there. It drives you crazy; the balance is so delicate.

Nobody sets out to offend or shock for the sake of shocking. You set out to get laughs.

Comedy's easy for me now - it's all about timing and the way you deliver lines. I use facial expressions to get the point across.

There was something about that form of comedy that's just difficult. It never really felt like you could just fully commit to all the colors that you carry with you.

Essentially, what I do on 'Supergirl' is I'm acting out comic vignettes. That is its own muscle to flex, and it is its own skill.

Laughter is binary: It either happens or it doesn't. As each joke arrives in the course of a film, the cavernous space of the theater is either filled with joy and laughter or with the quiet of cringing embarrassment. Every time you step to the plate to make a joke, you're going to experience one or the other.

Comedy is such a vulnerable thing. With drama, you're not trying to make someone cry. If you do, great, but that's not your goal. With comedy, you're trying to make someone laugh, so to me, it's harder because you are in such a vulnerable position. You're like, 'I hope people like this. I hope I do the joke justice.'

Sometimes, as a comedian, a line will come to you, that is so beautiful, so perfect, that you think: I did not create this line. This line belongs to all of us. Surely this is a line of God.