A Quote by Paul Lansky

I was hired for a really excellent academic job early in my life; I was twenty-five when I started at Princeton and I got tenure early on. I really didn't deserve this; I just happened to be in the right place at the right time.
For whatever reason, luck and word of mouth - my comedy career couldn't have started better. I went to Edinburgh, selling out this 300-seater just because I got the right place, right time, right venue, right buzz, right reviews early on.
When I first started, I didn't know what I was doing. I was such a - like a kid that got into things before I was ready. I was like the original learning-on-the-job-experience guy. All I knew was, if I hired the best musicians, I got the best arranger, and got the right songs for the right singer, I had did my job correctly.
I grew up doing musical theatre in Orlando, Florida. When I was 14, I just happened to be in the right place at the right time - a deliveryman heard me singing and offered to deliver my demo tape to Sony Music. I was just really lucky.
I saw an advertisement the other day for the secret of life. It said "The secret of life can be yours for twenty-five shillings. Sent to Secret of Life Institute, Willesden." So I wrote away, seemed a good bargain, secret of life, twenty-five shillings. And I got a letter back saying, "If you think you can get the secret of life for twenty-five shillings, you don't deserve to have it. Send fifty shillings for the secret of life."
At Rain Man, I was 38. And before that, I had really just started working when I was 36. I was very late. So I've got time, right? As long as I stay healthy and eat right.
I got really passionate about music with early Smiths and Joy Division. And New Order, Sonic Youth, Cramps...kind of right across the board, whatever fell underground. Kraftwerk...it was really mixed. Quite confusing, I suppose, but it just felt good.
Boys do tell you how they really feel. I think you just have to be in the right place at the right time or maybe be the right person
'Southern Accents,' I think that's one of my best, really. That would have been 1984, and I wrote that on the piano in the studio at home. I had a studio, and I just happened to be down there in the middle of the night. It was quite late, probably early morning, and I just started to play, and a song just started to appear.
Some sleep too much...there must be an excellent reason for the injunction to retire and arise early. ...You will profit by this counsel if you heed it...The world is a more beautiful place early in the morning. Life is so much more calm. Much more can be accomplished in a shorter amount of time... Some are habituated to going to bed late and sleeping much longer than your system really needs and thus missing out on some of the personal inspiration you could be receiving.
Life is short. From here to that old car you know so well there is a stretch of twenty, twenty-five paces. It is a very short walk. Make those twenty-five steps. Now. Right now. Come just as you are. And we shall live happily ever after.
I remember a distinct moment when it was my junior year of college, and the content I was making was changing and not really myself, and I tried to switch back to just putting me out there. I'm happy that happened really early in my career, because that was before I started doing podcasts or writing.
I'm really kind of boring - I'd rather go to bed early and get up early because I really value my time off, my time away from work.
It wasn't really until the 10th or 11th grade when I started to play well, and football took the place of baseball, which was my love when I was five years old. I don't know what happened; baseball just got boring to me, I guess.
I was an adjunct. I never got tenure, never had it. I was a professor, though. But I never got tenure. I never really wanted tenure, to tell you the truth. Really wasn't - the guys who got - the tenured people were some of, like, the least interesting. And they were people I didn't really like very much anyway.
I feel like my career has always been a series of collisions and accidents. Being in the right place at the right time. Having the right haircut. It's so mad to think that it happened in the way that it happened.
I'm really into antiques. But really into it because of my father, who got me into them in the first place. He's an interior designer and he's really into going to antique shows and getting up really early on Sundays and driving out to these weird little towns north of Hamilton.
This site uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience. More info...
Got it!