A Quote by Tom Stoppard

I think I enlist comedy to a serious purpose. — © Tom Stoppard
I think I enlist comedy to a serious purpose.
Comedy is a serious business. A serious business with only one purpose--to make people laugh.
I'd have to say that my favorite kind of film is serious comedy. Comedy with serious underpinning. 'Little Miss Sunshine' is like that. That's my fave genre, if I had to pick one.
I played a lot of serious parts in a lot of TV movies and early miniseries but what happens is that you get sort of locked into "Oh no, he's a serious actor." Well, I was a serious actor for nine years or 10 years and then I get into comedy and everybody said, "Oh no, he's funny. He can do comedy," and then all of a sudden, you're just a comedy guy.
My favorite kind of film is serious comedy. Comedy with serious underpinning.
I like all kinds of comedy. I like comedy that doesn't talk about real beliefs or serious thoughts, but then I also like the stuff that does. I think it just depends. It's a completely personal choice.
In my experience, it's not just that serious books get a hearing on comedy shows. But serious books get a serious hearing, as well as a funny one, on comedy shows.
I think it's harder to go from comedy to drama than from drama to comedy. Seeing you dramatic all the time, they crave to see you being silly or funny. But, seeing you in comedy all the time, it's hard to see that person go be serious, for some reason.
I like comedy, but I like comedy as a device in drama. It's more interesting for me to use comedy to seduce people into thinking about something serious. If you want to hit a beat in a drama, you can distract people with a little comedy, and you can punch them in the gut with some emotion.
I don't think that 'No Man's Land' is a comedy. I think that it's a serious film with a good sense of humour.
The first purpose of comedy is to make people laugh. Anything deeper is a bonus. Some comedians want to make people laugh and make them think about socially relevant issues, but comedy, by the very nature of the word, is to make people laugh. If people aren't laughing, it's not comedy. It's as simple as that.
Comedy makes me soar, and comedy is very serious business.
There is nothing that is so serious that you can't also see its comic side. Comedy is a way of talking about the most serious things.
Laurence Olivier said in an interview once that when he plays a tragedy he always aims for the funny parts, and the other way around. Because in a comedy you look for what's serious. I think that's true. Sometimes things are really funny if you're absolutely earnest. If you're really serious, it's hilarious.
Comedy is the result of what's happening, not what people are doing. Because if people are doing comedy. It's embarrassing. The individual elements have to be straight-faced, serious, realistic with a firm basis. What makes it comedy is a somewhat shifted way to put it together.
I think that there's a fine line between comedy and drama. I think that ultimately, the less winking that's going on when you're doing comedy - and this is just my own thing, and maybe it's why I've never been hired in comedy except by Bill Lawrence - but I think that the less winking you do with comedy, the better off you are.
Most of the jokes that I wrote were funny and there always seems to be an aspect of comedy in my long-form work. I think that's how life is. I think even the more dramatic moments of one's life are often punctuated by very funny comments or situations. I like to say, "Keep your comedy serious and your drama funny, and you'll be pretty true to life."
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