Quotes About Stand-up

When I used to watch comedians with my dad, he laid it all out for me. He wanted to be a comedian himself, and he was so funny. We'd watch stand-up on TV, and he'd tell me the subtext of what they were saying.

I've been driving in the city for years because, as a stand-up in N.Y.C., you can perform at more comedy clubs a night if you have a car. Getting from club to club by subway is too slow at night and too expensive by cab. So, many comics live far out from Manhattan and drive in every night.

Once I started doing stand-up, everything fell into place. That was when I started acting more; I felt like I'd found my place in the business.

I've always got the road. Stand-up makes you so autonomous and self-sufficient that it really helps with that part of show business.

With stand-up you've just got that one chance. Audiences can be quite fickle.

I made $225.81 a week as an accountant, and I went to $400 a week as a stand-up. I was up to $800 a week when I went out to L.A. In L.A., I made $25.

There are so many stars who are very good at comedy acts.

I guest-starred on 'Alf.' I played a stand-up comic Howie Anderson.

I like proper jokes. I don't like people who get applause because the audience agree with them.

Doing stand-up in front of arenas or clubs is something else; it's not a talent I have.

For the most part, comedians are pretty friendly with each other. They always say they badmouth each other, but most of the time, they're friends. We're the only ones that can really stand our type of humor.

I don't think being a comedian gives you any fucking insight into what makes people laugh.

A rap is a tweaked version of comedy, because comedy came first. People weren't spitting before they were doing comedy. Comedy has been relevant for years. It's the same art form, pretty much. Discovering that and applying it, I think that has made my stand-up better.

I've always been an actor, even when I was doing improv and my own version of stand up.

Even in my stand-up, there's a lot more positivity and enthusiasm rather than negative, I-hate-everything vibes.

In my comedy when there's a victim, it's me.

I have experienced bad dating and ineptitude with women all across the globe, from Vietnam to Paris. When I was 21, women were an enigma; they were this code that had to be cracked. They were 'The Other.' I have often thought writing this stuff into stand-up and shows would be an exorcism, but it hasn't been; it makes no difference.

A lot of women do stand-up as a gateway into acting, but I love stand-up, and to be a good stand-up, you have to go on the road a lot. It means going to places in America where they've never seen a Vietnamese person in their life.

Comedy is all about having a point of view, and it's also about power.

When people come to see my stand-up, they get a chance to see my characters interact with each other.

If you can't write your own material, you have very little chance of making it as a comedian.

Not since Jimmy Carr have I seen a cold computer programme on stage generate so much laughter.

Comics, a lot of them, are really depressed people, and I happen to be somebody that does have a lot of confidence. That's the odd thing about my stand-up. I am very confident. I always was.

I mean, the death in the late eighties and early nineties really shook out a lot of hacks. The pond just sort of dried up for a lot of really bad comedians.