Bernie Mac Quotes

I wasn't disciplined at all. As good of an athlete as I was, I was not disciplined. Had I had the drive that I have in comedy, and acting, and writing, that's why I knew it just wasn't right for me.

I want to play a villain - I can't wait to play a villain.

I want to do something that people can really say, 'Hey, man, that was good, I'm proud of you, I'm proud of that.' 'Pride' and 'Transformers' and things like that.

I ain't running for office. I ain't running for nothing.

My grandmother always told me how you start is how you finish.

Only way you can you get upset is when you expecting something.

I don't care about how I look; I'm dedicated to the laughs. You know, I used to be a clown, so - my name was Smoothie the Clown. All the training I had, all my training is geared toward making people laugh, and I didn't care about being cool.

I don't have no story. Everybody wants this Hollywood story, but the world don't owe you nothing, man. It's what you owe the world.

I took my sports experience to my life on stage. That's why I'm so disciplined. Playing sports, I was always underestimated. I was never picked first to do anything. This always helped me. It taught me how to push myself.

I've always been a reserved cat. When I play sports, there's people used to get mad at me because I didn't hang out and things like that. I've never been that kind of person. Nothing has changed in that regard. I've never been posse, and all that. I'm a quiet storm.

People like rumors. They're going to say things like, 'You was at the club with Lil' Kim, and you and Kanye West got into a fist fight.' You can't get upset. You've got to keep hope alive.

My humor had changed from foolishness to making sense.

Making people laugh is what I've been doing since I was like four or five years old. I still have a lust, I still have a passion. I don't care about how I look, I'm dedicated to the laughs.

Shut up before I drop yo ass off at Koreatown. Now hold on, America, don't start writing no letters. I'm just kidding. But am I lying?

Why do people love Richard Pryor so much? 'Cause he had problems.

I want to speak directly to the audience, to say, 'I'm like you - I'm frustrated, I'm not an expert, I don't have a manual on parenting, I make mistakes, I'm selfish too.'

If I can tell someone a story that makes them bend over and laugh, that's bigger than anything else.

I learned hard lessons in life; I had to because I had so much happen: My mother died my sophomore year in high school. The next year, same day, my brother dropped dead. Two years after that, I got married because my girlfriend got pregnant. The year after my wedding, my father - who I had only recently met - died.

The two sides of Bernie - that's a quiet weapon that I have.

Bernie Mac just says what you think but are afraid to say.

I want people to say at the end of my day, you know, like I used to say about Sidney Poitier and James Cagney and Joan Crawford and Red Skelton and those guys and Bill Cosby. They did quality and substance. You always remember them.

Black audiences are hard. They always think they're better than you. So you got to come with a little extra to satisfy them.

I think a lot of TV insults the audience.

You know, every time it comes, every time that light comes on or every time that camera comes on, every time that microphone comes on, the Mac Man seek and destroy.

Bernie Mac don't sugarcoat.

It's a pleasure to work with someone who is just as strong as you are.

I always wanted to scuba dive. I used to scuba dive undercover like black Aquaman.

The Bernie Mac Show' is my life. It's the truth, and I'm not ashamed of a minute, an hour, or a second of my life.

Suffering is a good teacher. It keeps you in its grip until you've learned your lesson.

I became the storyteller of South Side Chicago. I used an old Kiwi liquid shoe polish as a microphone. I'd go around the house interviewing everybody, telling stupid jokes, doing voices. I mimicked Sidney Poitier, Sammy Davis Jr., people on 'Laugh-In,' Flip Wilson.

Comedy has been so good to me.

Whatever success I've had, I always like to top it.

I'm funny. I'm a comedian. I'm not a clown.

When you're offstage, that's the footprint. That's the man God's gonna judge.

My family are police officers, detectives. My brother Mitch is FBI. Mitch is like that - a stern enforcer.

I'm looking for laughs, you know? If it take me to flip over a table, if I have to go physical comedy, I will do it. But whatever the joke needs at that particular time, is where I'm dedicated to. I'm not into beating somebody down and beating myself up. I don't do insults and things like that. I don't do it - I'm a storyteller.

I was good at keeping my mother from crying.

I'm so black, I leave fingerprints on coal.

That's the whole key to anything: Don't be afraid to fail. And is not afraid to fail.

I can act. I've been acting for a long time, but like anything else, don't nobody owe you nothing. You've go to pay your dues. You go from A to Z; you don't go from M to Z.

Okay, first rule of this carpool. No breaking wind in my car. The only gas that Bernie Mac want to be smelling is unleaded.

I've never been no superficial cat.

I don't ever watch myself. By watching, you try to perfect yourself, become a robot.

I'm not afraid to fail. Sometimes when you lose, you win. Sometimes when you win, you lose.

Sometimes when you lose you win, son. Failure is just life's way of preparing you for success.

When I started in the clubs, I had to work places where didn't nobody else want to work. I had to do clubs where street gangs were, had to do motorcycle gangs, gay balls and things of that nature.

I'm not ashamed to tell the truth about what happened in my family. I think that's what makes my comedy different.

Every time you see a black romance it's over-the-top. There always has to be extreme hostility between the sexes. He has to cheat. She has to show him how independently strong she is, not just as a woman but as a black woman.