I know how to make it a great musical. I've got to. It's like I've got to see it on stage.

My mind is a raging torrent, flooded with rivulets of thought cascading into a waterfall of creative alternatives.

My liveliness is based on an incredible fear of death. In order to keep death at bay, I do a lot of "Yah! Yah! Yah!" And death says, "All right. He's too noisy and busy. I'll wait for someone who's sitting quietly, half asleep."

Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die.

Every human being has hundreds of separate people living under his skin. The talent of a writer is his ability to give them their separate names, identities, personalities and have them relate to other characters living with him.

Immortality is a by-product of good work. Masterpieces are not for artists, they're for critics. Critics can't even make music by rubbing their back legs together. My message to the world is 'Let's swing, sing, shout, make noise! Let's not mimic death before our time comes! Let's be wet and noisy!'

Jewish women are very exciting, as exciting sexually as any other group. Even so, my advice to a young man marrying a Jewish girl would be to have three and a half years of foreplay. Of course, most girls in every group are reserved about getting down to it. They don't usually do it right away. But once they do it, women are bananas. They don't wanna do it, you can't make them do it, there's no way they'll do it - but once they do it, they don't let you alone.