Stand-up comedy is mine: it's my entity; it's my brand; I own it. I do it when I want to do it.
I think the comedy clubs tend to homogenize the acts a little bit, because they force them to be palatable in way too many environments.
I can't do jokes. I've always come from left field and tried to subvert conventional comedy. I started as a rebellion against that - albeit a very soft and surreal rebellion. It's escapist.
Comedy gives you a shot of euphoria that distracts you from everything that's awful.
Our everyday lives exist with comedy and tragedy next to each other.
I really enjoy playing that everyman part because that part is us, the audience. And you need somebody inside a comedy to tether the absurdity to reality.
One's dream is constantly evolving, rising and falling, changing course. This happens in every job, but because I have worked in comedy for twenty-five years, I can probably speak best about my own profession.
Jackie Gleason said that comedy is the most exacting form of dramatic art, because it has an instant critic: laughter.
It seems that two of the most basic forms of comedy are jokes and stories. And, of course, they are not mutually exclusive.
As the purpose of comedy is to correct the vices of men, I see no reason why anyone should be exempt.
I'd previously done 'Expelled,' and that was more on the comedy side, so I really wanted to challenge myself and see if I could actually do a drama.
There are elements of comedy that can be competitive and back stab-y, but one of the underreported sides is that we love each other and help each other, kind of like a messed up extended family.
I wasn't the classic comedy type; I wasn't bullied or extrovert. I was more the ambitious literary one who wanted to write clever little plays.
I think when I first started out, I had a kind of an exuberance about language, comedy, narrative leaps that... stopped just short of non sequiturs. And I'm much more cautious now.
There is nothing far-fetched about disappointment as a subject for comedy. It's something we are all too familiar with.
I've played farce on the stage, but I have never played any sort of comedy on the screen.
Comedy is unusual people in real situations; farce is real people in unusual situations.
Unless it's a flat-out farce, an actor can't play comedy on film.
I think the way comedy is represented on screen is it's either all fart jokes - and it's just laughter for the sake of laughter - or it's one of those things where it's just kind of very preachy, very heavy-handed.
'Mad TV' is one of my most favorite shows of all time and is a huge part of my obsession with sketch comedy.
