Quotes from David Baddiel

We are all frightened now. No one says anything public without looking over their shoulder and wondering, Have I said something wrong? Am I going to get in trouble?

If you can get tickets, a show on Broadway is worth the effort and expense.

My dad was a scientist. More than that: my dad grew up in a tiny terraced house in Swansea, the only child of a second-generation immigrant family - his father sold cloth, zips and buttons from door to door - and so science - biochemistry at Swansea University, followed by a PhD at Imperial College - was his way out, his way up.

Frank Skinner was a terrible flatmate in some respects. He never cooked and the cleaning lady refused to go into his room. But he was brilliant because he was very, very funny. You could just sit around at home and have a laugh without having to rely on any social arrangements.

Our culture is being shaped by trolls and the Holocaust deniers are a very extreme example of the trolls. Ignoring them has not worked. It doesn't mean that confronting them will work completely but I think it's a debate we have to have.

My show 'Fame: Not the Musical' is about the fact that fame is seen in two ways in our culture: either as a glittering bauble we desperately covet, or as a narrative of tragedy and despair. My own experience of fame is a third, mundane way, which often involves being mistaken for someone else - Ian Broudie from the Lightning Seeds, or Steve Wright.

Fame is a silly thing that makes your life absurd.

Baddiel is a slightly quizzical name - it comes from Latvia but people thought it sounded vaguely Hindustani or something. I thought it might be a good idea to write a body swap movie, like 'Trading Places' or 'Freaky Friday,' about somebody who believes they are one thing but suddenly become another.

I've seen episodes of 'Friends' which are as funny as any sitcom I've ever seen.

I'm not saying Jews should only play Jews... I personally think actors should be allowed to act.

I don't think comedians are better travellers but they are communicators and storytellers.

I had a 'the Cure' hairstyle, bigger even than Robert Smith's for many years. I used to do jokes about it which went well, but which meant I had to keep sporting it long after it was fashionable.

With the Kick It Out campaign, I was interested in asking: 'Why is antisemitism a lesser racism than other racisms?' I genuinely believe that to be the case - that negative stuff said against Jews isn't considered that important.

My theory as to why I first became a comedian is that my mother was always keenest on my younger brother, Dan. It doesn't bother me now, but it did then and the way I compensated for that was to publicise myself as myself - to tell people who I was in 100 per cent detail, going into every crevice of my life.

I tend to feed the trolls because it gives me material for my work. I'm sometimes taken aback by the racist and antisemitic abuse I get, but most of the time I'll get angry for a second, and then remind myself, 'This is material.' The trick is not to be too reactive.

Unfortunately, we no longer live in a culture where what is spoken about and what truths are told and what lies are told are objective any more, so my personal feeling is that you have to try to take them on.

Now 'South Park' - they are interested in blasphemy. They're interested in creating offence for its own sake.

My dad has dementia, so I monitor my own memory in a way that other people may not. As an atheist, I don't believe in an afterlife so I feel I need to fit in as much as I can while I'm here.

I've been aware of my own mortality since I was 12.

Basically, out of the sphere of what I do - being a comedian/writer, and out of the sphere of football, I am incredibly uncompetitive.

I feel uncomfortable if I'm not my self in any situation.

I think it is quite hard to be as angry and abusive face to face as it is online. But my fear is that as we get more and more normalised to abuse online, it will start spreading away from the screen.

Why is it kind of acceptable to say that the Germans are better at penalties, but not that blacks are better at boxing? Is it simply that you're allowed to stereotype a group perceived as oppressive, but not one perceived as oppressed - which is why it's fine for women columnists constantly to rail against men, but never the other way round?

Neurosis, an obsession with stupidly named food, bookishness - these are all OK to class as attributes that come hand in hand with a name that ends in 'berg'; the only possible exception being the money thing, although clearly we are better at accountancy.