Quotes from Don Rickles

Diana Krall I met in, I think it was Canada. She's a lovely lady. Her husband, Elvis Costello, is a great star.

The young comedians always ask me, 'What's the secret for staying around?' I tell them, 'There is no secret - just stay around. Longevity is the most important thing.'

I didn't get married until I was 38.

When you first start out with something new, you're always a little uptight.

Italians are fantastic people, really. They can work you over in an alley while singing an opera.

I stopped smoking. But my personality I still have. I get up in the morning, and not everybody loves me, so if you want to call that a bad habit, there's that.

The old days were the old days. And they were great days. But now is now.

I was 28 when my father died, and I was an only child.

There's a difference between an actual insult and a friendly jab. So I don't think I'm offensive onstage.

When I'm onstage, I'm acting.

I don't practice or write stuff down - everything I do onstage was just made up before I went on.

If something strikes me as funny, I'll put it in my performance.

I don't drink much anymore, but when I traveled with Frank Sinatra, God rest his soul, I used to drink like I could do it. He made it a test. In Vegas, the Rat Pack, which I was a little part of, drank all night and slept most of the day. Then, about 5 o'clock, we'd meet in the hotel steam room, lock the door, and steam our brains out.

Las Vegas is the boiling pot of entertainment.

My father was an insurance man and a small-time gambler. He was a good man, but he had an eye for the racehorses, and I saw how it used to bother my mother. I've never gambled a dime. Never, in all those years in Vegas.

I can get an audience screaming in Las Vegas and say, 'Barbara, that was a great show,' and she'll say, 'Would you please hurry up? We have dinner reservations at 9:30.'

I don't care if the average guy on the street really knows what I'm like, as long as he knows I'm not really a mean, vicious guy. My friends and family know what I'm really like. That's what's important.

I want to be a dog, but I'm a pussycat.

You lose your energy, you lose that excitement and it gets the audience up.

I have no idea what I'm going to say when I stand up to give a toast. But I do know that anything I say I find funny.

If I were to insult people and mean it, that wouldn't be funny.

You know what's funny to me? Attitude.

I don't really tell a joke, I react to situations. The whole thing is just looking at somebody and showing all our weaknesses and exaggerating them, and that's how it becomes funny.

I still think funny, and people young and old still come and see me. That's flattering. The day comes that they stop coming, then I'll know that it's time to retire to the Jewish ranch.