Top 69 Quotes & Sayings by Louie Anderson

I would trade everything I have to have had a happier childhood.

I have a very warm spot in my heart for Vegas.

You have to be funny about it and honest about it. You can't leave yourself out of that mix. You have to be honest enough to say, I'm that messed-up one in the family.

One time, I came off stage and a guy named Roman Decare, God rest his soul, he was a comic. 'Louie, if you do that family stuff, and you're a clean comic on stage, you'll become famous.' And, for some reason, a switch clicked, and I started doing the family stuff, and it became a giant part of my life.

A real estate closer. Oh, what's that? I'm a real estate opener. What is a real estate closer? You mean at the end where you've got to sign all those papers?

Dr. Phil was very helpful and caring. I believe he helped all of us there and watching how to better relate, understand, and communicate with our families and loved ones. Dr. Phil recommended reading my new book.

I had been asking the universe and God to send me a way for me to help me. Show business has been so wonderful to me, and it came in the form of that. It's just so funny how things come into your life, and if you take a chance on them, it might give you a brand new life.

I was with a famous comedian when a young fan walked up and asked for an autograph. The comedian blew him off. I'll never forget the look on the young boy's face. He was devastated.

I think I have always tried to connect my comedy to my art.

Everyone always comes to one point in their life as an artist where you can either let your heart guide you or your ego.

I'm at 23 feet, diving into 17 feet of water. I'm over 400 pounds. Who doesn't want to see that? I do. I'm always shocked that I can do it.

We all think we're going to get out of debt.

I can't stay long; I'm in between meals.

When I say, 'I can't stay long, I'm in-between meals,' that plays differently on the radio than it does in person. So I have to pick material that works because the words are funny, not just because of the images.

We were on welfare when we were kids. Thanks for reminding me of that.

I started a big part of my career in Vegas.

I really try to have fun. If I don't have fun, you won't have fun. That's what my gift is: to relieve people from a little of the pain and comfort in their lives by allowing my comedy to distract them. A good laugh is almost as good as any doctor visit.

All great comedians make me laugh, but people make me laugh more.

You can't open anything after your 50. You have to wait 'til people stop by the house. 'Oh my God, I'm glad you're here.'

If I have food in the house and I'm laying in bed, I go, 'I bet that Captain Crunch is lonely in the cupboard.'

I have about 1,000 hours of myself on tape in a vault in Los Angeles. But I also have a photographic memory about my jokes, because they're really about me; they're my stories.

Everybody wanted to make it. One guy makes it. In a family when one guy makes it... 'Hey ain't you going to help us out?'

I've been in Vegas. That's where you get into the money thing. Boy, you get greedy in Vegas, you know. That's the only place that you can bet $25, get it up to $500 and refuse to quit.

I felt ashamed for what I had done. I don't have any excuses. I did what I did. I take full responsibility for myself and my actions. I wouldn't pawn this off on anybody. I'm sorry it happened. And I hurt people.

I was kind of a Rickles comic to begin with. I was caustic, and I was abusive and mean to the audience.

Minnesotans really think they run the whole world, I love that.

I'm a 7 o'clock act. My people want to go to a show, a dinner and then go home and go to bed.

I was 10th of 11 kids in an alcoholic, abusive, poor family. We all want things that we can't have. And I found comedy.

Well, isn't every successful person in every family the bankbook?

My mom ate every piece of butter in the Midwest, she lived till she was 90. And my dad, he smoked, he drank - we finally just had to kill him.

I'm washing lettuce. Soon, I'll be on fries. In a few years, I'll make assistant manager, and that's when the big bucks start rolling in.

I think I'm a better actor now. I mean, I really think I know a lot about acting now. But I didn't know a lot about acting then, in 80's, and I never knew how to be myself. I never knew how to relax and just play it from me. I was always trying to deliver a line.

I really made the cartoon Life with Louie with one reason in mind: I didn't have a very good relationship with my dad, and we didn't all watch TV together like we should've, like you hope for, like you've seen on TV, and I wanted to make it for moms and dads and their kids. That was always my goal. And then I wanted to put real things in it. We did a thing about the homeless and won a Humanitas award for that.

You have to not worry or doubt or punish yourself. All the worry, doubt and punishment will not add one second to your life, you know?

I have to be very careful about how I do any stuff on sadness 'cause the crowd gets really sad and concerned for me.

Playing Mrs.Baskets was an interesting experience for me. It was the most rewarding thing I've done since Life With Louie. So you never know: If somebody asks you to put a wig and a dress on, you shouldn't just say "no" right away.You should at least see if there's money, fame, and satisfaction involved.

God and the universe said to me one day, "You're only going to get what's good for you." That's kind of how I try to look at things. Isn't that true, when you look back at things? "Ooh, I'm glad I didn't get that!" You get more philosophical when you get older, with the more life experiences you have. But I don't have any bad feelings towards anybody that was ever involved in any of that stuff, because I don't think that people usually set out to hurt you. I think that hurt is all manufactured by yourself and your expectations.

My mom was a garage sale person, save money. Come on in to the garage sale, you might find a shirt. She'd get in that garage sale and point stuff out to you. There's a good fork for a nickel. Yeah, that's beautiful. It's a little high. If it were three cents I'd snap it up.

Your agent or manager tells you. They go, "You're out. They're gonna get a new guy." But then I didn't feel bad. I didn't take it personally. Not that I'm competitive at all. But you have pride in that, you know? You want your ratings to be good. But now that I'm 62, I don't really care about the ratings. I don't care about the reviews. I care about the work, and I care about the people that I'm working with, and I try to make the experience for them and myself as good as it can be.

At Thanksgiving, my mom always makes too much food, especially one item, like 700 or 800 pounds of sweet potatoes. She's got to push it during the meal. "Did you get some sweet potatoes? There's sweet potatoes. They're hot. There's more in the oven, some more in the garage. The rest are at the Johnson's."

My first words were 'Seconds, please.' Most kids in kindergarten napped on a little rug. I had a braided 9 x 12.

I live in California, the worst place in the world for fat people. There are three of us. They have us on eight-hour shifts, so it works out.

I used to do my dad smoked, he drank, we finally had to kill him.

It's so much easier to be cynical.

I'll tell you how you know when you're on something good: when everybody starts to tear up when they're leaving, when they're wrapping for the season. You know, when you say, "All right, we're done with McGillicuddy. That's a wrap for McGillicuddy!" And everybody applauds, but everybody's sad, because McGillicuddy's going to be gone! You know, it's like family going off to college or war. You have this intimate relationship with these people, and then - bam! - they're gone.

If I were the last person on earth, some moron would turn left in front of me.

Real people are good and grumpy. They're nice and mean. And I come from a nice and mean family. My mom was nice, and my dad was mean. So I would've served myself a lot better if Louie Lundgren would've blown up at some of the people he was talking to. I think it would've really served everybody better. We'd probably still be on the air!

I think what people were trying with me was to figure out who I was. They thought I was funny, but they were like, "How can we use this guy so he can regularly do this?" Does that make any sense? I think people were trying to figure out if my fat peg would fit in their square hole.

Filming in Cloak & Dagger I was trying to get my Screen Actors Guild card. Everybody tries to get their SAG card if they want to be an actor. People might say that it was their dream to be an actor, but for me, I was a comedian. I already had a job. But I felt like there could be money there, and comedians don't make very much money, or they didn't in 1984.

I was a terrible actor. But John Hughes liked me, and he encouraged me. I made him laugh, I guess is the bottom line, and then he gave me that part in Ferris Bueller's Day Off as the flower man. It's just a nothing part in one sense, but it's such an iconic movie that people will ask me from time to time, "Are you in Ferris Bueller's Day Off?" "Yeah."

I'm a kid from Minnesota. I like seeing movie stars! So I'm there at The ivy, I've got my shrimp, Eddie Murphy comes in with his gang. I said to the waiter, as any good Midwestern boy would, "Hey, put Eddie's check on my American Express card, but don't tell him that I did it 'til I'm gone." Next day I got a call from manager who said, "Eddie's doing a movie, he was very impressed that you bought him lunch." So remember: sometimes buying people lunch can really work out well for you.

I just had a throwaway part, really, if you think about it. I'm not a natural actor, you know? I'm a comedian, through and through. And I really love my lines. Those are the lines I want to do.

I could be an alternative comic. I could be that really dark - I was - I was a very dark comic to begin with. I could be that guy, and the only reason I didn't is that I wanted to make money. I wanted to be popular. I wanted to be liked more than I wanted to be admired.

I'm still working! I think of all the other comics that didn't get the light shined on them, just because it's just how fame works, and it's unfortunate. But there are so many great comics out there who are still working, and I still see them.

I'm a big game show fan. When you're a poor person, you watch game shows. I don't think people realize that. Maybe everybody watches game shows, but when you're poor, you live vicariously through those people.

My inspiration is coming more and more from the way I feel and the gratitude I feel. The older you get the more humility you have.

My mother loved people and she loved conversation, and she loved to engage with people. She was a really fantastic person. You would've really liked her.

I think Splash made people realize that I was still alive, and I think I inspired a lot of people. I have people coming up to me all the time in the airport saying, "Hey, you inspired me to learn how to swim!" "You inspired me to start moving around more." "You inspired me to start doing more for myself." So that was good. But mostly I took it because nobody had given me a job. And you know what really matters in life, right?

I had been asking the universe and God to send me a way for me to help me. Show business has been so wonderful to me, and it came in the form of that. Its just so funny how things come into your life, and if you take a chance on them, it might give you a brand new life.

One thing to remember when you're successful, famous, whatever you want to call it - well-known, not that well-known - whatever you want to go. One thing to remember is your family's not famous, and they're not well-known.