Best Improv Quotes

#1. Theatre sports is the best improv training period.

Wayne Brady

#2. I think for anyone - male or female - in improv, the biggest thing to get over is the fear. I think every improviser has that.

Rachel Dratch

#3. Maybe it's just my improv and sketch background, but I'm a lot more comfortable in a group. I like sharing focus and populating an ensemble.

Jason Mantzoukas

#4. Believe it or not, this simple phrase, "Yes! And . . ." is the secret of improv.

Amy Lisewski

#5. Improv requires one thing I lack that I think most mothers need - the basic instinct to put someone else first.

Jen Kirkman

#6. With improv, it's a combination of listening and not trying to be funny.

Kristen Wiig

#7. Practice your improv more than learn your lines. 'Cause there's no way you'll be able to learn all those lines in a short time. You have to realize what you know and what you don't know - and what you don't know, just come up with three alternate lines or improv that you can put in that spot.

Anthony Mackie

#8. I joined an improv group in college, which was a lot of fun. After I graduated, I moved to Chicago to try to get into the Second City.

Steve Carell

#9. These games create a space for us to play together and connect with our joy; they also develop imagination, confidence, critical thinking, trust, connection and understanding within groups

Hannah Fox

#10. I always loved acting and improv and sketch comedy and theater, which I did at a local youth theater.

Emma Stone

#11. Improv is a very big thing for me. The thing with actors is I do not understand at all how they do what they do. I'm fascinated by it, and I have such a respect for it.

Gina Prince-Bythewood

#12. Well people love to go dirty and stuff like that. It's funny, because even really dirty things can kind of inspire, but all things inspire really dirty improv and monologues. So then really dirty things can inspire the exact opposite. It's kind of a crapshoot.

Amy Poehler

#13. Improv kind of goes hand in hand with what I do. I was on 'Reno 911!' for six years, and that was a completely improvised show.

Nick Swardson

#14. Many of the people I've worked with over the years came from a sketch-comedy background or an improv background, and I've learned a lot from them.

Megan Mullally

#15. For the last 30-plus years, I have been doing one long, uninterrupted improv.

Henry Rollins

#16. You have to be able to fail with the improv. You have to not care.

Adam McKay

#17. If you are in an improv jazz ensemble or a small chamber group, you learn to think fast on your feet and how to be flexible and to collaborate and compromise, and that may yield a creative outcome.

J. Richard Hackman

#18. Some of the best stuff in all my movies has been improv.

Catherine Hardwicke

#19. The best thing about improv is that no matter how bad your show is, it's only 30 minutes, and never exists again. The worst thing is no matter how good your show is, it's only 30 minutes, and never exists again.

Mick Napier

#20. When improv is bad, it's excruciating to watch, and to be involved with it is a unique type of torture.

Zach Woods

#21. I guess I'm sort of spoiled because, most of the things that I get to do, people know that you're a good improviser, so they allow you at least one improv take, and for comedy, that's great.

Matt Walsh

#22. What I don't like is when I see stuff that I know has had a lot of improv done or is playing around where there's no purpose to the scene other than to just be funny. What you don't want is funny scene, funny scene, funny scene, and now here's the epiphany scene and then the movie's over.

Paul Feig

#23. When I started stand-up, the first thing I did was to take an improv class.

J. B. Smoove

#24. What brought me to L.A. was work! I moved to Chicago after college - I went to Kalamazoo - did my nerd thing, graduated, and moved to Chicago to pursue improv.

Steven Yeun

#25. I know how to have a conversation, but I've never done improv. I've never taken improv classes.

Brie Larson

#26. I've always wanted to be an actor. I didn't get into this game to be the best improviser in the world. I didn't choose improv as a stepping stone, it just happened to become one.

Rob Corddry

#27. When I moved to New York at 22, I didn't know what I wanted to do. I took an improv class, and the first scene I did, I felt like 'I want to do this for the rest of my life.' It was the first time I ever felt like that about anything. I tried to make a living off improv.

Kurt Braunohler

#28. Is this a generation of orphans who are going to the improv to do stand-up?

Mindy Kaling

#29. I worked with Marlon Wayans on the show 'They Wayans Brothers,' and we hit it off. One thing about Marlon, when he casts a movie or a TV show, he expects you to bring it. You've got to be ready to improv, because Marlon will say anything, and you've got to be ready to come back.

Kym Whitley

#30. Improv is so different, it's such a collaborative thing, you're working with other people, nothing is planned and it's kind of this community mentality, whereas stand-up, you're alone and it was really hard.

Aubrey Plaza

#31. Taking improv has helped every other aspect of my field.

Ben Schwartz

#32. I haven't done improv since I was in middle school.

Gillian Jacobs

#33. My natural inclination to be improv rather than an educated character serves me well.

Gary Vaynerchuk

#34. Things that make me laugh range from a wonderful stand-up like Jerry Seinfeld, Louis C.K. and Chris Rock to my son Gabe, who does great improv work. I also look backwards to the great comedic actors like Jackie Gleason, Paul Lynde and Phil Silvers.

Jason Alexander

#35. I'm a goofball, so I think comedy is one of my stronger points, as an actor. I just never get to do it. But, I'm taking classes at Groundlings, where Will Ferrell and Lisa Kudrow studied, and it's all improv comedy. It feels good to be able to do that and be funny.

Tinsel Korey

#36. My brothers and I always did improv stuff in our basement with our friends; we're super nerds, and that was our way of spending a Friday night.

Tatiana Maslany

#37. When I finished my residency in New Orleans, I went to L.A. where I would work as a doctor during the day, and then at night I would actually go to The Improv and do standup, all the while kind of cultivating my comedy resume.

Ken Jeong

#38. Tracy Ullman, I grew up watching her shows and standup and improv and specials. Bette Midler and Whoopi Goldberg. They inspire me to do it all. I always wanted to do it all; I never wanted to be put in a box.

Bresha Webb