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What people really want is not to make something funny, but to make something amusing - which, in many ways, is the opposite of funny. To amuse someone is to eliminate discomfort and awkwardness, kind of like a massage for the brain, while to be funny is to point out awkwardness and discomfort. Everyone thinks they want funny, but they really want amusement.
Christian FinneganTeenagers falling off skateboards - funny. Nut shots - funny. Breaking wind - funny. The world cannot change those. Those three things are columns upon which humor is built.
John OliverThere are a couple hard things. One, getting a funny idea that people can relate to; a funny idea or a funny script; there's a million pitches.
David SpadeSome people are funny, and some people are not funny. Many people who are not funny can make a living at it. You don't have to be great to make a living at it. Just like a doctor who doesn't have to be great can still make a living out of it.
Woody AllenThere's always a source for humor [in politics]. If it's inappropriate to write about, if there's nothing funny about it, then it's not funny. So it sort of selects itself. It has to. And plus, often something that wouldn't be funny at the time is okay to make jokes about later.
Calvin Trillin[Shaquille O'Neal ] walked in and said we were hiring him, so we said, "Yes sir!" Shaq is a genuinely funny guy. He's really funny in the movie. He's not just a stunt cast- he's a genuinely funny actor.
Dennis DuganI've never been funny. I don't think I'm funny. People say I'm funny. I go, 'No. No. I'm not.' But again, knowing what it means to film on a TV show and on film, you have to repeat, repeat, repeat. You have to do the same thing a number of times if you're filming a sequence. And to carry that energy in a comedic mode, would be a challenge that I really would frightfully scared, but I'd have to buck up and pull up my bootstraps and say, 'I can do this. Let's figure it out.'
Tamlyn TomitaIt is not funny that a man should be killed, but it is sometimes funny that he should be killed for so little, and that his death should be the coin of what we call civilization.
Raymond ChandlerI always tend to remember the funny moments. When I lost my shoe (even though it was funny) there was something motivating about it, I just ended in this spastic emotional way. I tend to remember the more extreme moments.
Laura Bell BundyGreat, big, serious novels always get awards. If it's a battle between a great, big, serious novel and a funny novel, the funny novel is doomed.
Neil GaimanThe reason why you know more funny dudes than funny chicks is that dudes are funnier than chicks. If my daughter has a mediocre sense of humor, I'm just gonna tell her, "Be a staff writer for a sitcom. Because they'll have to hire you, they can't really fire you, and you don't have to produce that much. It'll be awesome."
Adam CarollaMovies these days have made killers into funny people. What's that all about? I've got kids and family and friends, and I don't like bad things. I don't think they're funny, and it's irresponsible to make movies that don't show you how that's not good.
Billy Bob ThorntonI read "Pride and Prejudice" [by Jane Austen]. I was gobsmacked by it - it's so funny and so modern. Unbelievable. You don't expect funny to come through after 200 years - humor doesn't transcend decades, let alone centuries.
Julie WaltersI have funny bones. If there's ever any kind of tension, I'll always be the one to try and be funny to loosen things up.
Matt LeBlancYou figure they cheat at the ballpark, they'll cheat on the golf course, they'll cheat in business, and anything else in life. Players may laugh about it and say it's funny, but right down in their heart, they don't think it's funny at all, and they have no respect for a person who cheats.
Bob FellerMy way of looking at the world is that if it is true, it is funny and it is dark. No matter how dark it is, I just think it is funny. I can't help it.
Maria SempleComedy is not commercial; it is risky, because what is funny in one place isn't always funny somewhere else.
Lloyd KaufmanI'm a fan of Bill Hicks. He did things that no other stand up did at the time. He was making fun of religion, at that time it was a lot harder to say those things in the States than it was here. To slag off Christianity and fundamentalist Christians, and to be pro drugs and anti gun in the deep south, that's a big ask. And he did that and made it funny. Bill Hicks was able to say things that he really thought, and he managed to make those thoughts funny without a care if it antagonised people.
Ed ByrneYou mostly know that you want to be funny, know that you have the desire. It's not like people who grow up beautiful and can look in the mirror and be like, I'm beautiful! Funny is more of a journey. And a desperate attempt.
Tina FeyI think that if you're serving yourself before you're serving a story then that's where you end up being not funny. It's not about being funny, it's about telling a story and then the comedy comes out of the situation, I think.
Zooey DeschanelWhen I was a teenager and all these shows were on I was in that business, so I knew a lot of people in the theaters and I saw many of the great shows many times. I would go in and stand in the back - they would let me in, they knew me. I saw Fiddler on the Roof, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Gypsy, and Funny Girl many times just standing in the back.
Christopher WalkenI'm an unorthodox type of guy, a funny guy - at least I think I'm funny. And one of the things I like to do is come up with nicknames for myself.
Shaquille O'NealBob Dole used to be really funny. Barney Frank can be kind of funny. Bob Kerrey has a good sense of humor.
Al FrankenSo, I sit at the hotel at night and I think of something that's funny. Or, If the pen is too far away, I have to convince myself that what I thought of wasn't funny.
Mitch HedbergThe Conquest is not a film about Nicolas Sarkozy - it's a film about political conquest. It's a Shakespearean expression, where we have all the elements of a drama, both political and personal at the same time. The decors and the costumes are all based on real photos - I wanted to be as close to reality as possible. Nicola Piovani's theatrical music gives a distance that's almost Chaplinesque, there's something quite funny. There's no imitation, no caricature, no parodie - it's realism with a distance where the dialogues are often quite funny.
Xavier DurringerI used to like Barbra Streisand films. It was Funny Girl that really turned me on, in a sense, to acting. I remember it specifically being a rainy Saturday afternoon. I couldnt play football, so I stayed in, and I watched Funny Girl.
Sean HarrisThere's nothing that beats proving you're funny by making a funny thing, and right now there are huge outlets for that, with You Tube and all the other stuff online.
Louis C. K.Screaming at children over their grades, especially to the point of the child's tears, is child abuse, pure and simple. It's not funny and it's not good parenting. It is a crushing, scarring, disastrous experience for the child. It isn't the least bit funny.
Ben SteinI'm not a naturally funny man. I find that I can only be funny, if I become someone else.
Rowan AtkinsonThere are really funny alternative comics and really funny straight comics who write and perform traditionally.
David CrossThe trick is always to write in pairs because if at least two people find it funny, you've immediately halved the odds of it not being funny.
Steve CooganWhen I read a script, I have to see the funny, and if I can see it's funny, it helps me to be able to transmit that.
Jessica WalterI find a lot of things kind of funny and I often say what's on my mind, and then get nine texts from all my friends going, 'What's the matter with you?' But I haven't ever made a big attempt to have any particular image. And I don't really worry about it. If it's funny, I don't care.
Kate BeckinsaleWhat we set out to do with this movie [Leaves of Grass] was to create something that was funny and serious and had large tonal ambitions. A movie that could be poignant and funny, and suddenly quite violent. To have a character utterly sideswiped, and to learn that life is about balance.
Edward Norton"I've learned what's funny verbally ain't so funny on e-mail: They don't hear your intonations. Melissa broke up with somebody over that. She tried to tell him: "That was a joke!" But he just didn't get it. Mick Jagger said, "F- 'em if they don't get the joke." And I love him. That comes with age: Knowing it's their problem, not mine."
Joan RiversI say if a novelty Christmas song is funny one time, then it is funny every time. - Calvin
Bill WattersonThe middle class is so funny, it's the class I know best, and it's the class where you find the most pretension, so that's what makes the middle classes so funny.
J. K. RowlingI make people laugh hard; I'm a comic, that's just the way it is. And I make them laugh because I'm funny, not because I'm filthy. The subject matter is dirty, but the pictures I paint are really funny. A lot of comics don't understand that that's what it's about. It's just, "I'll be dirty and they'll laugh." Nobody's becoming a superstar that way.
Andrew Dice Clay