When I was a kid, I loved all the silent comedians - Buster Keaton, Laurel and Hardy, Chaplin. And I used to imitate them. I'd go to see a Buster Keaton movie and come home and try things out I'd seen. I learned to do pratfalls when I was very young.

We used to get 27, 28 minutes to do a story in, and now they're lucky if they get 18 or 20 minutes. So I don't think they can really do a beginning, a middle, and an end anymore. There's an awful lot of one-line jokes; almost every line is a punchline. It's not the same, but there's still good comedy around.

I don't play golf. I have more fun singing and dancing.

When I auditioned for 'Bye Bye Birdie' on Broadway, Gower Champion said, 'You've got the job!' I said, 'Mr. Champion, I can't dance.' He said, 'We'll teach you what you need to know.'

I'm not quite as much of a curmudgeon being old. I'm not cantankerous. But otherwise, I'm about the same.

Bob Hope, like Mark Twain, had a sense of humor that was uniquely American, and like Twain, we'll likely not see another like him.

Rob Petrie is who I really am - in personality and general ineffectiveness.