Quotes from Ricky Gervais

I stand by 'I'm not going to do 'The Office' again.' That would be weird: all the same people sitting at the same desks at a paper merchant's in Slough.

I really just want to make Karl Pilkington the new messiah.

I haven't had my teeth fixed, I haven't had a hair transplant. I haven't had a skin peel, tummy tuck. I've done literally nothing.

I think the social faux par is probably what most people fear... more people fear public speaking than death and that's because we don't want to make a fool of ourselves. It's fundamental.

No one wants to see cool people doing brilliantly. I want to see the struggle. That's the fun bit.

I use people's real voices because I want realism. So often I mention the actors' physicality because I want it to be like a real documentary.

I think it's important to hold a mirror up to society and yourself.

There are no Hollywood stars speaking out for the elderly. They're forgotten, bewildered, and I don't think it's because people are cruel or don't care. It's because you don't want to think about your own mortality. I think people don't talk about it enough.

I think Spielberg is a master. I think 'Jaws' invented a genre.

I think Dustin Hoffman has been in at least three of my favorite movies of all time with things like 'Tootsie,' 'Marathon Man.' Getting a bit more arthouse and darker, 'The Graduate' - incredible, barrier-breaking movie, 'The Graduate.'

I don't mind what people say about me as long as it's an opinion or the truth. If someone says, 'He's the worst comedian in the world,' that's fine. If someone says, 'His face makes me want to punch the TV,' that's fine. But if they say, 'Oh, and I know for a fact he hunts squirrels,' I go: no, no, no... that's a lie.

Take a picture not a trophy This is how real men shoot animals

With Netflix, I browse; I watch documentaries about things I'd never dream of, but I think, 'I might as well.'

I think being nice is more important than being clever.

Cynicism, to me, is trying to make people as unhappy as you are.

A couple of people I knew went to university apart from me, but all the way through I was the smartest kid in the school. That's luck, but I was proud of it. And I was also proud of doing well without trying. As you get older, and it took me a long time to realise it, that's a disgusting attitude, revolting.

I didn't like noisy cinemas when I wasn't famous.

To be fair to David Brent, he wants to be famous for doing something, for being a musician, but he's just not good enough.

When I go to work, I don't want to make depressing, gritty, urban stories that are depressing to watch. I want to give people something to enjoy. When people think I'm a control freak and an ogre - which I am - it's only because I want my work to be accessible and Everyman, in a way.

Sometimes being old is used as an insult, which is bizarre because, if you're lucky, that's literally going to happen to you. It's a strange thing to gloat about: being born recently.

All of my friends are oddities.

It's funny because I was offered film parts the first week after 'The Office' went out. I was sent a script, and I said, 'Who's the lead?' They said, 'We want you to be.' And I said: 'Well, who's going to go and see that? You want John Cusack.'

I don't do one-liners, because you don't learn anything about that comedian.

When I was growing up, I didn't like cheese. I had to wean myself onto cheese.