Respectful Comedy Quotes

In 'Waiting for Guffman,' the character I played, the Corky character, he's very serious about what he does, and it's not meant to be mean that this is a small town and these people aren't the most talented people. They're trying the best they can. So to be mean, that would be kind of horrifying in its superficiality.

You do a clean show and it's over and the audience have enjoyed themselves and you've enjoyed yourself, and you haven't had to resort to shock.

If you watch most of the stuff on TV and in movies, it's usually put-down humor. It's like somebody being mean or cynical or thoughtless to another person. I never wanted to be that type of comedian.

Whatever the joke is has to be funny, and not coming from a mean-spirited place. I think some things are totally off limits. If someone's spouse died, or one of their children, I would never joke about that in a Roast situation. I don't have any aspirations towards writing any cancer jokes, and there's some stuff that I think is definitely taboo.

We kept a broad audience, and we didn't make fun of people who had necessarily made mistakes in their life and burned them to the ground. We made fun of a commercial or a movie or ourselves.

I personally don't feel any pressure to make jokes about multiple baby-fathers and stereotypical black jokes, because one, that's just not my life, and two, I wouldn't even sound right talking about those things.

The Disney tradition - number one, it's a great American classic tradition - and it's something where you don't want to go over certain lines. You want to poke fun, but you don't want to poke fun in a way that's hurtful.

I love Kathy Griffin, I think she's brilliant, but for me, there is a line when I go OK, that's too much.

With the Tonys it's a little tricky because a lot of the funnier jokes are more insider, so people watching at home may not get a Julie Taymor reference the way that New Yorkers would. So you have to figure out what comedy plays to a large audience and still respect the individuals who are there.

It was such a pleasure to work with Eugene Levy. What a treat. That's a guy I grew up watching as a kid. Guys like that, they were hilarious and didn't have to be super vile or X-rated.