Top 138 Quotes & Sayings by John C. Reilly - Page 3

The kind of über-objective is to make people laugh. You always have to have that in the back of your mind, "Eh, I've got to figure out a way to make this funny."

Life is often confusing and sad, and I'm a big fan of the slap and the tickle, as they say.

I think just getting a movie done is an accomplishment in itself.

I'm alienated from this world because its weird and I don't want to be a part of it. I want to be part of the people that are more imaginative and crazy.

Unless you do the same thing, it's tough for stereotypes to stick. That said, whatever you've done that's most popular at a given moment is what people think "you do."

It's kind of liberating to be able to bring your own ideas to things, but it's also a lot of pressure, it's like screenwriting on your feet.

I would say whisky or pills. Not both because that can have disastrous consequences.

I end up improvising in almost everything to some degree, 'cause it's often necessary on movies. The script is one thing, and it's this kind of theory of what you're going to do, and then you get there on the day and you realize, "Oh, the script is not appropriate to this room, the door's over here."

Kind of the exhausting thing about doing pure comedy, or something that's broader, is you're kind of a slave to the laugh. If it's not funny, then there's not much point in doing it. The kind of über-objective is to make people laugh. You always have to have that in the back of your mind, "Eh, I've got to figure out a way to make this funny."

I'm not a huge sports fan in general, I don't spend a lot of time watching other people do stuff. I tend to like to go out and do stuff myself.

A lot of times, mainstream critics are much tougher on small, independent movies because they can be.

[Country Music] is the final destination for many punk rockers [...] Rockabilly is the mid-point and then [they] end up at Country [...] There's purity to that music and I think that appeals to a lot of punk rock people - the precision, the purity, and the directness of Country Music.

I was thinking maybe about being a lawyer. I realized I was interested in becoming a priest at one point. I was just interested in stuff where I could do something I really believed in. And then, I realized if I become an actor, I don't have to choose. I get to do everything. It's worked out so far. But what I really want to do is direct.

I mean I was very shy but I was also very extroverted because I was doing plays. I'd been doing plays since I was a little kid. But, I did feel like an outsider because I went to like a 'college-prep' kind of high school that had a really big football team and was known for its program so I was like this weird boy that did plays.

If you get made fun for the way you look, then maybe wearing the same thing every day is the best way to protect yourself.

I had [at school] my own little posse of people that all felt weird together so it wasn't so lonely.

I'm much more character based. I try to just be really committed to what I'm doing.

I'm bored by repeating myself, and I would imagine that an audience would be bored by me repeating myself.