"At the Sahara, the seats are banked and most of the audience is looking down at the stage. Everybody in the business knows: Up for singers, down for comics. The people want to idealize a singer. They want to feel superior to a comic. You're trying to make them laugh. They can't laugh at someone they're looking up to."

"When I do an hour-and-a-half show, if I don't improvise 20 minutes worth of new material each night, I feel I've let myself down."

"I was born to be funny."

"You look up at drama, down at comedy. A singer, looking up is okay. A comic, it's death."

"It is not funny that anything else should fall down only that a man should fall down. Why do we laugh? Because it is a gravely religious matter: it is the Fall of Man. Only man can be absurd: for only man can be dignified."

"Athletes tend to have less of a sense of humor than most people. They are heroes to so many. That might be part of it."

"I guess when you turn off the main road, you have to be prepared to see some funny houses."

"The key is just to ignore the pain, because physical comedy only works if you see someone get hurt and they aren't actually hurt. If someone gets hit in the face with a bat, falls down, and gets back up, it's funny. If they stay down and their jaw is wired shut in the next scene, it's really tragic and weird. You have to pretend it doesn't hurt."