Top 1200 Tragedy And Comedy Quotes & Sayings - Page 17

I was in a band and it wasn't working out the way I wanted. Then somehow, little by little, I started doing a couple comedy things. All of a sudden I was being asked to do more and more comedy things. There was this message from the world saying, "Maybe you should go this direction."

When I was a little kid, I was a huge fan of 'The Kids in the Hall.' They were like my boy band. I was obsessed with sketch comedy. Being raised Christian, I was somewhat sheltered from the more radical high-art world. So to me, comedy was where people got to express themselves in an abstract way. It was a big part of my growing up.

I had always drawn, every day as long as I had held a pencil, and just assumed everyone else had too…Art had saved me and helped me fit in…Art was always my saving grace…Comedy didn’t come until much later for me. I’ve always tried to combine the two things, art and comedy, and couldn’t make a choice between the two. It was always my ambition to make comedy with an art-school slant, and art that could be funny instead of po-faced.

Comedy is more difficult. You can look at scenes when you're doing a drama like, ?Maybe it works,? but in comedy, when you're doing it, either it works or it doesn't. You have to keep doing it until it does, and the requirement is more.

I was open to anything. That doesn't mean I would do anything, it just means I was open to anything. I've met for dramas, single camera comedy, multi-camera comedy. I take each script as an individual project.

It's always the girl comedy and the guy comedy. It bums me out. You'd think there'd be a progression, from James L. Brooks and Nora Ephron into more subtle humor and behavior and psychology. All these interesting things people can learn about themselves by watching talented writers comment intelligently on someone else's emotional life.

I did skit comedy online for many years, beginning around 2001. Around 2006 I started watching a lot of food television and got re-interested in food. I come from a very food-obsessed family. But I also wanted to do my own thing, which was the comedy.

The great thing with comedy is that I don't memorize ahead of time like I did on 'Breaking Bad.' With 'Breaking Bad,' I wanted to know those words inside and out, really have my lines down so I could say them verbatim. But with comedy, you keep it a lot more loose.

I don't think one gets to choose the kind of comedy he/she does. I may not talk about Rahul Gandhi's take on an ordinance, but I will talk about things as simple as a 'chappal' or a 'sherwani.' My comedy is about small things, and that is how it connects.

I've never done an actual Western, and I would love to do that. I've done drama and dark comedy stuff. I've never really done a romantic comedy either. I would do that.

All the parts I get offered are character and comedy parts, and I probably wouldn't get them if I had a different face. So I'm glad I have a comedy face.

Comedy is really my passion. I started out way before television doing sketch comedy with other women. Very much along the lines of, at the time it was 'Sensible Footwear', but now it's 'Smack The Pony', 'French And Saunders', that kind of thing. That's how I started out.

I like a naturalism to my dialogue and my comedy. I would rather have a few jokes sail by that might be more subtle than have every single joke hit hard. I would rather the comedy come out of character as opposed to feeling forced. Even if you're giving some laughs up for it.

The only difference between comedy and drama is that, in comedy, I'm going to utilize the tool of creating laughter to deflect discomfort and, in drama, I won't use a tool, but we're going to actually deal with the discomfort and see what comes out of it.

Comedy people like other comedy people. People hang out and are friends and do shows together, and when you get something going like a TV show or a movie, you want your friends to be in it and make it funnier. That's just the way it should be.

Here's a woman, a real pioneer for other women looking for careers in stand-up comedy. And talk about guts - she would come out here and sit in this chair and say some things that were unbelievable - where you would have to swallow pretty hard... but it was hilarious... the force of her comedy was overpowering.

Tension is all about, 'Why is this taking so long?' The interesting thing about that is that it's also the tension of comedy. The tension of drama and comedy is similar, and that's why usually you can get a big laugh in a really tense moment because people need that release.

I think, in general, when you're doing comedy, you're having a good time regardless of the comedy table tennis that you're playing. I think you want that, too: you're rooting for two characters to be together, and you should feel that even when they're angry at each other, they're still in synch with each other.

I'll probably stick to comedy for the time being. I mean, a great piece of work is a great piece of work, and I'm up for good work anytime. But I do love comedy!

The funny thing about The West Wing is - and I don't know what Aaron Sorkin says about it - but I'm convinced it was a comedy. It's a very intellectual and cerebral comedy, but it was SportsNight in the White House. It had an energy and a vitality and an intelligence and a passion that's rare. And it was extremely difficult to do, because they were so demanding about the dialogue.

I've noticed, as a comedy fan, that I really like Paul Thomas Anderson or Quentin Tarantino because when they're funny, they're actually funny. It's not like when other dramatic writers have comedy, and I'm just like, 'Well, that's not funny. Why are you even trying to make a joke here?'

I get to do physical comedy! When do women get to do physical comedy? Very rarely.

The population increasing, some of it could be in countries we haven't thought of making art in. I've never entertained making comedy in China. Like what world is that? I don't know how they would perceive art or sketch comedy. It's not a matter of intellect; it's a matter of language.

Comedy comes easily to me, and so for me, comedy is suspect.

Some people get into comedy because they love comedy. Then there are people who have a message and have realised that if they can be funny, maybe people will listen to it. And then there are people like me, who are just addicted to making people laugh.

Comedy in the past hasn't spoken to women because it wasn't written by women, and male writers don't make women three-dimensional characters. Too often, women just facilitate the man's comedy: they're not crazy; they're not funny. But women are as vulgar as they are elegant, as stinky as they are smelling of eau de parfum.

I'm like the Davy Crockett of comedy... after Davy Crockett opened up the West and helped everybody... they didn't need him anymore. I freed a lot of comics... if I never would have done comedy, it would've been a different art form... I'm sure of it.

If I had my choice in life I would have had the gifts of Tennessee Williams or Eugene O'Neill. Unfortunately my gifts lie in comedy and so comedy comes fairly easy to me and I occasionally have an idea for a very serious piece and I do it, but the ideas don't come that readily to me.

In comedy, it's not the glamorous, beautiful people that are great at comedy. They're either every man or every woman, they're either quite tall and lanky or shorter and fatter or have a big nose. They have something physically about them that makes them into a comic stereotype.

I know a lot of girls in the comedy world who are kind of like me. I don't know where the slutty girls hang out, but it's not the comedy world as far as I know.

Like, I'm trying to make a statement that clean comedy is somehow better or loftier than dirty comedy, and I don't feel that way at all. I just think it's different. It's different. There's rock music, there's jazz music, there's reggae music: All of those forms are different.

I've always been a fan of comedy, and I understood from a young age that what makes most comedy work is the immediacy of first person experience. I'd spent a lot of time from 1995-1998 focusing almost exclusively on poetry, and it's an incredibly difficult form in which to achieve a sustained comic tone unless you're Alexander Pope.

People always say 'You do racial comedy.' And I don't, exactly. I do cultural comedy. Because race and culture are two different things. There's black people from America and then there's black people from Africa. Racially, they're the same; culturally, they're extremely different.

To me, Fight Club was a comedy. When [David] Fincher sent me the book and I read it, the first thing I asked him was, "This is a comedy, right?" he said, "Yeah, that's the whole point," and I said, "Okay, I'm in." I certainly wasn't imagining myself as a dramatic actor when I was running around in my underwear in that film.

When I was in improv workshops or doing stand-up or writing comedy with others, or just doing comedy, I just laughed. Funny was funny; I loved to laugh. I always liked people I found generally funny.

If there's anything I hate more than a stupid action comedy, it's an incompetent stupid action comedy. It's not so bad it's good. It's so bad it's nothing else but bad.

Comedy and drama are different sides of the same coin. And the thing about comedy and drama is about likability. It's about character first. It's about story. And for me, it's about empathy, and I think the realer someone is, the further you can go either way with them.

I'm not a billionaire, what a tragedy.

My friend and I founded the New York Arab-American Comedy Festival to counter the negative images of Arabs in media. And we always made sure that the comedy came first. So we weren't a bunch of Arabs trying to be funny. We were a bunch of comedians who just happened to be of Arab heritage.

The world's so big, it's hard to pick one best friend. I like everyone in Venezuela, but in L.A., I hang out mostly with my comedy friends. Guys like Paul Scheer, Rob Riggle, Owen Burke, Ed Helms, Seth Morris - we all kind of came up together doing comedy in New York.

Growing up as a comedian the most influential person on me was Jon Stewart. He showed that comedy could have a real tangible effect on the world. He showed that comedy could move the needle of society and that a comic can do real things and make a real contribution.

I like comedy, not violence, but violence is making a lot of money. But comedy is what I like.

You know, sometimes I worry, you know, is comedy and my type of comedy going to get stale? Is it going to be so offensive that it becomes uninteresting or so niche that I don't have an audience anymore? But it keeps getting bigger and bigger and bigger, where roasting now is a movement. These roasts are on in India, in Mexico.

I love comedy, I love comedy... I think I'm funny!

I would like a comedy. A comedy would be nice.

The principles of comedy are the principles of comedy. I can hear funny.

I grew up watching 'Ghostbusters.' I loved that movie before I knew it was a comedy! As a kid, I lived between Ghana and Detroit and in Ghana for, like, first and second grade. And I had a VHS tape of that, and I would watch it every day. It's kind of like why I got into comedy.

I very rarely laugh. I remember I used to have a joy at comedy. I remember going to see Sean Lock for the first time live, just in some comedy club when I was 18, and again, just guttural, pure laughter. I didn't know what he was doing; I couldn't see the tricks.

I think that 'Mr. Show' was a huge influence on me. It was literally the reason I started doing comedy, because I was asked to do a bit at The Comedy Store, and B.J. Porter and I went to see Bob and David - who I'd never heard of - do a live show, which was one of the shows that got them the 'Mr. Show' show.

Comedy prepared me for drama. There are a couple techniques you can think of. One of my acting teachers said that comedy is like ping-pong, and drama is tennis. You take things a bit slower, so you do get to breathe more and take some more time.

When people say, 'How did you start in comedy,' I say my family was kidnapped by ninjas when I was very young, and to get them released I had to do a killer five-minute set. And even after I did that, you know, I started doing comedy under tough circumstances, I still kept at it because I enjoyed it.

I was always interested in comedy, like when I was 5 years old. I watched 'I Love Lucy' and 'Benny Hill.' I would always joke around with my sister. My mom was into comedy, too. She would go to the video store and get a couple of movies and some stand-up comedians' tapes.

I did a lot of theatre when I started out. It was the Lyceum, the Citz, the Tron and the Traverse. I came to London and did the Royal Court, the National, 'King Lear' at the Manchester Royal Exchange. I did little bits of comedy, like 'Rab C Nesbitt,' but I wasn't predominantly about comedy.

What is scary to me is silly to somebody else. CG isn't scary to me. It's like comedy - comedy and horror are quite similar, in that there'll always be somebody who'll say, 'I don't think that was funny.' And it's the same with things that are meant to be scary.

I'm proud of everything I've done. If it's comedy, it's 'cause I think it's funny. If it's a drama, it's impactful. I'm leaning towards dramas now because I wrapped a couple comedies in a row. I don't like watching myself, but it's easier on me when I don't have to carry a lot of the comedy. But I enjoy making comedies but dramas come more naturally.

I've been doing comedy longer than I haven't been doing comedy, as I was performing for three years before I even got on 'The Tonight Show.' There's truly nothing like it; it's intense and exhilarating, even though it looks so casual.

As a woman, she [Penelope Cruz] obviously has changed as she has become an adult. But, as an actress, I actually might say that she has not changed that much. And she has something great, especially in comedy, and she hasn't been exploited as much as she could be in comedy, but particularly in that mix between comedy and drama. She's got a very special quality about her. You can place her in very extreme situations, especially very painful situations, in terms of how her character interprets it. And sometimes, the deeper and more human that pain is, the better she is at it.

...the tragedy of consumerism: one acquires more and more things without taking the time to ever see and know them, and thus one never truly enjoys them. One has without truly having. The consumer is right-there is pleasure to be had in good things, a sacred and almost unspeakable pleasure, but the consumer wrongly thinks that one finds this pleasure by having more and more possessions instead of possessing them more truly through grateful contemplation. And here we are, living in an economy that perpetuates this tragedy.

When I graduated, I was director of my school's sketch comedy group, and I knew that I wanted to be writing and performing my own sketch comedy. It kind of made me want to do my own one-person sketch group.

I think for me, the best comedy comes from when something feels real and genuine, so even though Miranda is this wacky character, there is a real vulnerability to her that we finally get to show in 'Haters Back Off,' and I think that's what makes this comedy rich and more fulfilling, at least for me.