You have to be ruthless with yourself, in terms of being honest about what is working and what is not.
I think I realized it was an art form at the beginning, but it took me a really long time before I was able to view what I was performing myself as an art form.
I think the kind of person that gravitates toward New York is a person that’s not so much focused on controlling exactly how they appear and how they exit. They’re more fascinated with the process.
I really had to imagine the kind of person that I would have been if I had never left my hometown. I don’t think I would have been a very pleasant person.
It’s the method of consumption, not what’s on the plate.
Any comedian who tells you how dark and dangerous they are, they’re not dark and dangerous.
There’s nothing wrong with doing comedies, and I’m not against comedies, either, but I always want to do stuff that keeps me off my guard and gets me out of my comfort zone.
Yeah, there were a few years in the early nineties where I really began to hate what was valued as funny and just sort of what was valued in stand-up, period.
One of my groupies gave me a film that they made, and it ended up being amazing, so I got it shown at South by Southwest. If I can help get their stuff out there, then great.
What you want to worship above youth, I think, is beauty, and beauty is so beyond just appearances after a while. Because you can be with someone who’s good-looking; if they open their mouths and they’re an idiot, then they cease to be beautiful very quickly.
I think right now is the best time for stand-up, ever. I sincerely do.
There’s something kind of beautiful about that pure love of things. Like, “I’ll show that I love the thing I love by hating everything else.”
The process is to me is going onstage night after night after night after night until I get a new hour. And then once that hour is solidified and recorded, I move on.
You saw a lot of guys, especially in the early ’90s, whose acts were a pitch for a sitcom. A lot of them were very funny, but there’s nothing worse than watching comedians or musicians who are up there and are doing something they’re not interested in.
Movies, to him and the majority of the planet, are an enhancement to a life. The way a glass of wine complements a dinner. I’m the other way around. I’m the kind of person who eats a few bites of food so that my stomach can handle the full bottle of wine I’m about to drink.
I’ve been very lucky in my life in terms of people who are able to tolerate me.
Imitation leads to exhilaration when you follow it back to its source.
The man is clear in his mind. But his soul is mad.
Part of being in your twenties is not knowing an ally when you see one.
Does anyone act more like an overserious senior citizen with time running out on their chance for immortality than someone in their twenties?
Vincent van Gogh was a “tormented genius” the way Jimi Hendrix was a “guitar player.” I.