When I was first divorced, I started dating younger women, and it was really exciting. But after a while I was like, 'This is just dumb.'

You have to do a show as honestly as you can. But you also can't afford skepticism, because it's preparing for failure, which is useless.

You would never do stand-up without an audience. I mean, no one would even consider it. It's like they're the instrument you're playing.

It’s been a very old thing for people to gather together and laugh at stuff. The first comedian in America really was Abraham Lincoln. He used to go to a pub near where he lived and stand in front of the fire and he packed the place every night and he would just talk and bust everybody in their guts. He was just a hilarious speaker and that’s what he did.

I like being full, every day, with stuff that I have to do.

The earliest stand-up comedy I was aware of was Bill Cosby. I watched Saturday Night Live as soon as I was aware of it, and Monty Python used to be on PBS at weird hours, so I used to try to watch that. And I loved George Carlin on SNL, that was the first stand-up I ever really remember seeing on TV. And then Steve Martin. I guess I was in fifth or sixth grade when Steve Martin showed up, and he was instantly my idol. And Richard Pryor around the same time too, I sort of became aware of him, though I don't remember the first time I saw him.

Credibility lasts about two cycles of bad material, and then you'll probably never get it back. If you let people down, that's really hard to come back from - harder than climbing from nothing to something, even.