If you’re quiet, you’re not living. You’ve got to be noisy and colorful and lively.
Ill just say whats in my heart: Ba-bump, ba-bump, ba-bump.
Every human being has hundreds of separate people living under his skin...
The only weapon I’ve got is comedy.
The egg cream is psychologically the opposite of circumcision – it pleasurably reaffirms your Jewishness.
When you get big special effects pictures, sci-fi and things, there’s little or no comedy. Or it’s a domestic comedy and there’s not one special effect. But very rarely do these things fuse and come out right.
We mock the things we are to be.
Organizations like the CIA and the FBI are still kind of supermen, kind of SS troops: We’re blond and the best and everyone else should be incinerated. They don’t know right from wrong. That’s what makes a satire of these government bureaus really funny.
That’s it baby, if you’ve got it, flaunt it.
Merchandising, merchandising, where the real money from the movie is made.
My mind is a raging torrent, flooded with rivulets of thought cascading into a waterfall of creative alternatives.
My job is to go out and entertain the most people possible. The job is to make people laugh. I don’t have a mission. I don’t have a torch to burn.
Nothing is free. You got to pay to be in society. First you start with homework.
My God, I’d love to smash into the casket of Dostoyevsky, grab that bony hand and scream at the remains, ‘Well done, you god-damn genius.’
Look, I had to take chances or it wasn’t fun being funny.
You got to be brave. If you feel something, you’ve really got to risk it.
I’m married to a beautiful and talented woman who can lift your spirits just by looking at you.
Sir, I have seen your film and it is vulgar! Madame, my film rises below vulgarity.
Not only should we laugh about Hitler. We must laugh about him. Especially in Berlin.
The final test of fame is to have a crazy person imagine he is you.