Quotes About Comedy

There's a difference between delivering real funny and just silly funny.

I know, when I was in film school, some of my films were silly, but a lot of them were more dramatic. I don't think I intentionally set out to do comedy stuff. I guess that's a consequence of coming up working with David O. Russell and skewing toward those sensibilities.

'Smart Funny & Black' came about because I felt that black comedians were being considered as only capable of a certain type of comedy - sort of physical, kind of silly - and I felt like we are not a monolith, and our comedy isn't, either.

For a lot of comics who aren't as silly or physical but more intellectual, we get looked at as 'alt comics.' No, I'm still a black comic, and there are black people who want to hear my type of black comedy, but that space hasn't been built out for us.

David Wain's character on 'Bob's Burgers' is really funny and silly and makes me laugh.

The joys of making a comedy are that it feels very playful and silly, and the energy is totally different because they want you to feel free enough to come out with something a bit mad.

The best jokes take something awful and make it silly.

The point with me is that it's always been, even with the stand-up, that the music has to be right. You have to take it seriously. You have to try and play it as faithfully as possible. That way it helps the comedy. Rather than just playing it in a silly way.

What I do with impressions, I try not to be mean-spirited. To me, it's just about being silly.

A lot of the stuff I do is broad, physical, quite silly.

A lot of the stuff that I want to create personally is usually pretty absurd or silly comedy stuff.

Often it's seen as empowering if you're cleverer than the men, or more aware - then you're giving the woman a great strong role. And that's true to an extent. But when it's a comedy, you want to be as mad and silly and funny as the men.

If comedy can be both - silly and fun but also say something and start a dialogue - that's the most you can ever ask for.

What Paul and I do is not fashionable - it's a load of silly characters mucking about.

A lot of comic actors derive their main force from childish behavior. Most great comics are doing such silly things; you'd say, 'That's what a child would do.'

Some comedies, they want you falling on your face and doing silly things.

I'm not saying that comedy has to be a certain thing - I'm not trying to define comedy, where it's like, it can only be silly things. But I think part of what makes a comedy is that at least part of the mantra of the show is trying to make people laugh.

One of my favourite movies is 'Annie Hall' because it's about the silver lining of the break-up.

I don't really know how music and comedy are similar. I try never to dissect it theoretically or academically.

Stuff that I write isn't as similar to the stuff that I'm in, but I don't really care. I just do comedy.

I try hard not to repeat myself and not to do material other people are doing. We transcribe every other late-night show to make sure there's no similarity.

I've seen so many excellent actors - excellent actors - who, the minute they're told they're in a comedy, turn into God knows what - creatures from another planet! I mean they just... the voice changes, they don't look the same, it's like - it has no similarity to any living human being, do you know what I mean?

I told Simon, 'I don't want to play Oscar. I want to play Felix because Oscar is too easy. He gets all the laughs. Felix is a hard part; that's the part I want to play.'

You can trust a Neil Simon script. Every dot. Every dash; that pause means something. He takes all the jokes out, practically.