Quotes About Comedy

I personally find it difficult to accept that there could be anyone on earth insensitive to the comic abilities of Laurel and Hardy, Sid Caesar, Woody Allen, Mel Brooks, or Martin Short. But no matter who the comic entertainer is, there is always at least a minority prepared to say, 'What's all the excitement about? He doesn't seem funny to me.'

Historically, Hollywood comedy has arrived in skinny envelopes. From fence post Buster Keaton to herky-jerky Jerry Lewis to wiry nerve-bundle Woody Allen to hung-loose Richard Pryor to whippy contortionist Jim Carrey, its comics and clowns have tended to be sliced thin and bendable.

It's always been a dream of mine to be in a Woody Allen comedy.

My heroes - people like Woody Allen - were stand-up comedians. Therefore, I always felt I should give it a go.

I definitely have a little Woody Allen inside of me. That is true.

I'm ready to do a Woody Allen comedy.

People who I've worked with are always like, 'Why aren't you doing comedy? You're funny!' because they've only seen the one side. I did do the comedy 'Whatever Works,' with Woody Allen and Larry David.

I am a big fan of the old Howard Hawks films from the 30s and 40s, I was a big Hepburn and Tracey fan for a while and Woody Allen films that are a very different kind of romantic comedy.

From the onset of the 'Live-Read' series, we wanted to hit all the major writers and Woody Allen is simply one of the greatest screenwriters of all time. He has ability to match pathos and comedy and drama and then turn it all on a dime. If you're going to make a series based on dialogue, you can't find much better than Woody Allen.

My personal favorite is Woody Allen, who is just amazing as a comedian.

I love 'Bullets Over Broadway,' but I'm pretty sure Woody Allen hasn't killed somebody.

When we created 'Goodness Gracious Me,' it was quoting 'Python' and Woody Allen lines that really bonded the writers, and the 'Spamalot' material is so utterly, wonderfully surreal that it hasn't dated.

I love doing comedy, and that's the thing I will always go back to, really, but I'd love to have the freedom to do sort of 'meaty' roles but also have the freedom to do the sort of films I want to make, like what Woody Allen does. You forget he's funny because you're so gripped by the story, but they still make you laugh.

You probably can't name more than a handful of comedies that would qualify for Best Picture. I can think of a lot of comedy screenplays; Woody Allen has had numerous nominations for his screenplays. But most comedies are calculated. They tend to pander. They're not about anything important.

I think I always have Woody Allen in mind whenever I'm creating anything. He's such a genius, and I think 'Annie Hall' is one of the greatest movies ever written.

I've always wanted to make people laugh. It's been my only ambition, ever since my dad introduced me to the genius of the great comedians: Tony Hancock, Woody Allen, people like that.

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.

When people see my show, they may not laugh out loud as they do with some of the classic comedians, but they do enjoy it. I regret that I called it comedy to begin with; I should have called it 'An Evening With' or put it down as spoken word. But the emphasis is always on funny stories.

Even if you didn't see the movie, you'd see two words you'd never seen put together before - comedy and Muslim. Comedy is friendly - it's the least offensive word in our language.

The reason I keep talking about a wife and saying the word 'wife' on stage is because it seems a funny word to me. The more you say it, the more it seems to detach from that person and become this sort of abstract thing: that you would set out to find a wife, that it would be an objective like buying a new car.

Impressions are still kind of hard for me and not what I love to do the most, but with characters, I think there's an element of fearlessness. You try to figure out the best reading and wording of the jokes before the show, and then you just really have to go hard.

I think 'lunch' is one of the funniest words in the world.

Here I sit, beneath the large window of a first-floor Georgian flat, exploring the corridors of my sordid imagination for comedic words of beauty.

With everything, 'Shooting Stars' included, we'll just have some words on a card to prompt us - 'How would Rod Stewart die,' that kind of thing - and we'll just run with that idea, as if we were talking to each other, messing around. And I'm no scholar of these things, but I think that's what double acts should do, isn't it?