Pryor Quotes

#1. I went to Zimbabwe. I know how white people feel in America now; relaxed! Cause when I heard the police car I knew they weren't coming after me!

Richard Pryor

#2. Marriage is really tough because you have to deal with feelings ... and lawyers.

Richard Pryor

#3. It's not our mistakes that define us, but what we do about them.

Lindsay J. Pryor

#4. Whereas I want everything to be peaceful during a birth, I take the total opposite approach when I'm helping someone come to terms with leaving this place - I play Richard Pryor records.

Erykah Badu

#5. When Richard Pryor did comedy, it was like he was having a conversation.

Tracy Morgan

#6. When I was younger, I listened to the greats: Winters, Mel and Carl, Nichols and May, Pryor, Carlin, Klein, Berman and lots of Lenny Bruce albums. But once I started doing fairly well, I didn't want to hear anybody's jokes or premises.

Richard Lewis

#7. My father was funnier than me. My father was Richard Pryor-funny. I'm just a better businessman.

Tracy Morgan

#8. Pryor's comedy isn't based on suspiciousness about whites, or on anger, either; he's gone way past that. Whites are unbelievable to him.

Pauline Kael

#9. Let's clean up the Senate and return to politics of common ground.

Mark Pryor

#10. If I thought about it, I could be bitter, but I don't feel like being bitter. Being bitter makes you immobile, and there's too much that I still want to do.

Richard Pryor

#11. Like it or not, the people of Arkansas sent me to Washington to represent them in this great body.

Mark Pryor

#12. I think about dying. I've come to realize we all die alone in one way or another.

Richard Pryor

#13. I bought my parents a home before they died, and they got to see that I was going to be all right. They always thought I would go someplace.

Richard Pryor

#14. I'm telling a Richard Pryor story through me.

Mike Epps

#15. Now, Richard Pryor was unique. Many misunderstood his humor. He lit up the hallway, but they didn't understand his use of profanity. He didn't use it just to be using it; he used it in the context of his satire.

Bill Cosby

#16. Movies are movies, and I don't think any of them are going to hurt the moral fiber of America and all that nonsense.

Richard Pryor

#17. Have you ever noticed how quiet you get when you go in the woods? It's almost like you know that God's there.

Richard Pryor

#18. Everyone carries around his own monsters.
Richard Pryor

Jonathan Maberry

#19. I was a loner and never hung out with anyone. I never had any friends.

Richard Pryor

#20. I'm not for integration and I'm not against it.

Richard Pryor

#21. Friends take up time, and I didn't have time.

Richard Pryor

#22. I've always liked Richard Pryor. I've always responded to rhythmic profanity.

David Rees

#23. I love show business. I wake up every morning and kiss it.

Richard Pryor

#24. And now here we are," he said. "Both knowing what you are, both knowing what I am. And that, my little fledgling sacrifice, must make me your worst fucking nightmare.

Lindsay J. Pryor

#25. People walked out on Richard Pryor and he's the funniest man alive.

Tracy Morgan

#26. My dream role is Richard Pryor, no question about that. I'm a big Richard Pryor fan. I've always been intrigued about the darkness behind his comedy; that would always be a dream role for me.

Dorian Missick

#27. If you ask me about women's lib, I say I don't even know what that is.

Richard Pryor

#28. Rebounding helps a lot with your ball skills, because you're able to go get the ball at a high point, which is what they want you to do in football.

Calvin Pryor

#29. Imagine people calling you to find out if you're dead. I've led a real crazy life at times, and I've had many strange things happen to me, but that was one of the strangest.

Richard Pryor

#30. You breathe too fast to be convincing,' he goaded.
'You don't breathe enough to judge me.

Lindsay J. Pryor

#31. I was an only child.

Richard Pryor

#32. I think about being married again, having a home and a wife. No one can ever be married too many times, and maybe if I keep trying I'll get it right one day.

Richard Pryor

#33. Life does not stand still for families and local communities when our brave men and women are deployed, but we can make their time apart more bearable by recognizing their sacrifice and fulfilling our commitments to them.

Mark Pryor

#34. I've never seen anyone more messed up over success than Richard Pryor. For him, it's a constant battle between success in the white world and keeping it real for his black self.

Paul Mooney

#35. I was given two weeks to walk again, so I hooked up with a trainer, and he ... had me walking. I'll never forget that, it was grueling.

Richard Pryor

#36. I just don't want to die alone, that's all. That's not too much to ask for, is it It would be nice to have someone care about me, for who I am, not about my wallet.

Richard Pryor

#37. As a kid, I loved Paula Poundstone and Richard Pryor. But my mother was a huge influence on my comedy.

Tig Notaro

#38. The rarity of what you hold is more powerful than you can imagine. It is a gift for humanity and the most lethal curse to the vampires.

Lindsay J. Pryor

#39. What I'm saying might be profane, but it's also profound.

Richard Pryor

#40. You can be funny and say what you mean; these ideas are not mutually exclusive. Some of the best jokes came from people who meant it. See: Pryor, Bruce, Carlin, etc.

Hari Kondabolu

#41. I had some great things and I had some bad things. The best and the worst ... In other words, I had a life.

Richard Pryor

#42. Rob glanced back at the glint of the blade as Caleb spun it once more. 'So what - you want information?' he asked,looking back at him'You want to talk'?.
'If talking means I ask questions and you answer them'.
Rob exhaled sharply. 'Is that what the tickingclocks about?some kind of threat.

Lindsay J. Pryor

#43. I was thinking about comedy and how comedy in many ways opens us up to ideas and really being influenced by Richard Pryor and sort of the way he would use comedy to really speak about larger social issues.

Terry Gross

#44. Rosa Parks showed us all that one little person can make a whole bunch of noise without so much as a whisper. She showed the world that the color of your skin shouldn't determine what part of the bus you sit in ... as you ride through life.

Richard Pryor

#45. I'd much rather see Richard Pryor or Jackie Mason in a theater than in a club.

Elayne Boosler

#46. There are only two pieces of pussy you're gonna get in your entire life, that's your first and your last.

Richard Pryor

#47. Mike Tyson, what can I say about you that hasn't already been the title of a Richard Pryor album?

Anthony Jeselnik

#48. I always look on imagination as one of the most powerful things we can cultivate in young people. If they have a good, active imagination, they can cope with life better; they are ... able to imagine possibilities and to think around problems.

Michael Pryor

#49. There's nothing worse than being an aging young person.

Richard Pryor

#50. On the comedy side of what I love as a filmmaker are Richard Pryor, Lenny Bruce, and Eddie Murphy; those are my favorites.

David Dobkin

#51. Countless emotions could be masked by the sexual act, but a kiss, the most intimate and passionate of exchanges, concealed nothing.

Lindsay J. Pryor

#52. I like Louis C.K., Chris Rock. Old schools like Richard Pryor and Eddie Murphy.

Adam DeVine

#53. Few if any teenagers can relate to getting up for school and finding famous comics like Pryor and Williams hanging out in your living room after a hard night of partying. But that's Hollywood.

Pauly Shore

#54. I played three sports in high school, baseball, football and basketball. Baseball really helped me a lot.

Calvin Pryor

#55. But for the use of physical punishment by, and fear of their oppressors, animals would never be a part of a circus.

Richard Pryor

#56. When you're running down the street on fire, people get out of your way!

Richard Pryor

#57. Yes, I'm religious. God has shown me things, made certain ways clear to me.

Richard Pryor

#58. As Richard Pryor was to Eddie Murphy, that's what Kurt Vonnegut was to me.

Christopher Moore

#59. Do you know how you felt when you would lean all the way back in a chair, and just before you were about to tip over, at the very last second, you'd catch yourself ? That's how I feel all the time.

Richard Pryor

#60. I think you're so busy reading between the lines, you're missing the sentence on the page.

Lindsay J. Pryor

#61. You have to have lived some life. You've got to have paid some dues.

Richard Pryor

#62. I was kicked out of school because of my attitude. I was not assimilating. So I went to work, taking any jobs I could get.

Richard Pryor

#63. If he touches me, I'll kill him.' 'If he touches you, I'll kill him,' he said, gazing deep into her eyes.

Lindsay J. Pryor

#64. A lie is profanity. A lie is the worst thing in the world. Art is the ability to tell the truth.

Richard Pryor

#65. Two things people throughout history have had in common are hatred and humour. I am proud that I have been able to use humour to lessen people's hatred.

Richard Pryor

#66. My grandmother used to discipline me, I mean, beat my ass, and I deserved them, too.

Richard Pryor

#67. I'm slower and some days are better than others, but I'm a fighter.

Richard Pryor

#68. I can't just say the words, do a lot of one-liners. I love each person I play; I have to be that person. I have to do him true.

Richard Pryor

#69. I used a lot of what we call the "Shred-mill." It's like a treadmill, but you're basically running up hill and it's getting faster as you go. It definitely helped at the combine because it teaches you drive phases, how to pump your arms and how to use different aspects of your body.

Calvin Pryor

#70. Basketball also helps you learn to move your feet by playing defense and guarding guys, and that all carries over to playing football with staying square and having good footwork.

Calvin Pryor

#71. Rain meant hoods up, umbrellas up, deficiency of sound, lowered eyes. Rain disorientated and distracted people, making the kill or capture so much easier.

Lindsay J. Pryor

#72. When I was a bit older I had all of the George Carlin records, all of the Steve Martin records, all of the Cheech and Chong records and all of the Richard Pryor records.

Marc Maron

#73. Vampires might bite, honey, but lycans tear.

Lindsay J. Pryor

#74. W. Kamau Bell is in the vanguard of a new era of American comedy for an unsettling, troubling, and strangely hopeful time. Firmly in the fearless tradition of Mort Sahl, Lenny Bruce, Richard Pryor, & Chris Rock. Comedy as common sense purged of the absurd hypocrisy that is Our America.

Vernon Reid

#75. Even when I was a little kid, I always said I would be in the movies one day, and damned if I didn't make it.

Richard Pryor

#76. I opened up for Richard Pryor in 1992. I had a conversation with him. All those other comedians can say what they want about what they did, but I opened up for the man. Paul Mooney and I are probably the only ones that can say that.

Mark Curry

#77. The MS really started going downhill in 1990.

Richard Pryor

#78. Historically, Hollywood comedy has arrived in skinny envelopes. From fence post Buster Keaton to herky-jerky Jerry Lewis to wiry nerve-bundle Woody Allen to hung-loose Richard Pryor to whippy contortionist Jim Carrey, its comics and clowns have tended to be sliced thin and bendable.

James Wolcott

#79. Since I'm not focusing on my speed as much now as I was heading into the combine, I'm really focusing on my position work, trying to perfect how I play the safety position. I've been doing a lot of backpedaling and drills that focus on turning my hips, which help me out on the football field.

Calvin Pryor

#80. Being able to write creatively or read creative fiction is the best way to exercise your imagination.

Michael Pryor

#81. I have already discovered that it is useless to ask neuroscientists questions that lie outside their specialty. The dopamine guys know the dopamine guys, but they don't know the cognitive-processing guys.

Karen Pryor

#82. Unfortunately, the show's success comes at the expense of its biggest asset
the comedians themselves.

Richard Pryor

#83. Freebase? What's free about it?

Richard Pryor

#84. Show me one guy or woman as funny as Rodney Dangerfield or as good as George Carlin, Richard Pryor, Bill Cosby, or Joan Rivers. There are a lot of good comics out there, no doubt, but as far as the quality of the comics goes, I think what you have is a bunch of situational comics.

Chris Rock

#85. You don't get to be old bein' no fool ...

Richard Pryor

#86. Who you gonna believe-me or your lying eyes?

Richard Pryor

#87. When you ain't got no money, you gotta get an attitude.

Richard Pryor

#88. I'm not punishing you.'
'No?'
'No. You'd know if I was. Trust me.

Lindsay J. Pryor

#89. A sold-out house my first night back. Do you have any idea what kinda pressure that is? I could have been at home in my warm bed, playing Nintendo.

Richard Pryor

#90. I see people as the nucleus of a great idea that hasn't come to be yet.

Richard Pryor

#91. What I am for is justice for everyone, just like it says in the Constitution.

Richard Pryor

#92. Who you gonna believe, bitch? Me? or your lying eyes?

Richard Pryor

#93. I'd like to make you laugh for about ten minutes though I'm gonna be on for an hour.

Richard Pryor

#94. I don't do this relationship shit, Caitlin. But I see you because I want to see you; I'm with you because I want to be with you. That's the truth.

Lindsay J. Pryor

#95. When I got on Stern I realized that this was the one job where you could be really honest and open, almost like Richard Pryor or something. You can be honest about your life and get laughs.

Artie Lange

#96. I ain't no movie star, man. I'm a booty star.

Richard Pryor

#97. I won't talk about what it was like in prison, except to say I'm glad I'm out and that I plan never to go back and to pay my taxes every day.

Richard Pryor

#98. I believe the ability to think is blessed. If you can think about a situation, you can deal with it. The big struggle is to keep your head clear enough to think.

Richard Pryor

#99. The truth is, I've never thought of myself as the Michael Jordan of comedy. And that's a good thing. You know why? Because I'm not. Wasn't that Richard Pryor? Yes, it was. I know what I am: I'm funny!

Tracy Morgan

#100. I can be a little prickly when people make assumptions about women.

Michael Pryor