The kick [of comedy] is to think quickly. It's a great kick.

You know how Van Nuys got its name? Well, one day my little old Jewish mother was visiting me, and I took her to the top of the Hollywood Hills and had her view the valley below just at sunset. Well, mama, what would you call that? And she said, Ver nize.

I don't consider success doing a show for 30 years; I'm sorry. To me, you're successful when you graduate from something. I did a series, I did a talk show, I did movies, I replaced Mickey Rooney [on Broadway] in "Sugar Babies." You understand?

Today you can go to a gas station and find the cash register open and the toilets locked. They must think toilet paper is worth more than money.

One time we were having dinner and some guy came by and took a potato off of Frank Sinatra's plate. And Frank said, “Hey pal, are you hungry?” The guy says, “yeah.” Frank said, “Sit down.” And he gave him his dinner. I thought for sure there was gonna be trouble from the guys surrounding Frank, but Frank says, “Jeez, relax, the man's hungry.”

The other day I started to take a course in psycho-ceramics. What is psycho-ceramics? It's the study of crackpots.

A woman driver went through a red light. The cop stopped her and said, Lady, didn't you see that red light? The woman said, You've seen one, you've seen them all.