Top 40 Quotes About Doing Stand Up Comedy
#1. I've seen stand up comedy, and after a while you start to notice that a lot of people are doing things that are like a lot of other people. There can be a bit of a herd mentality, and that's obviously less interesting because there's less going on. I'm just being totally frank with you.
Dylan Moran
#2. If you are doing stand-up comedy, you have to be confident in what you are doing. That doesn't mean just because you are confident you are funny.
Judah Friedlander
#3. I was doing stand-up at a restaurant and there was a chalkboard on the street out front. It said, Soup of the Day: Cream of Asparagus. Ellen DeGeneres.
Ellen DeGeneres
#4. People need to write articles and they need to have angles in them and I'm grateful when people are doing articles, but I always say there's not a great mystery to stand-up comedy.
Jim Gaffigan
#5. I took a job in a comedy club - not doing stand-up comedy, because that's my idea of hell, but in the office - and I went traveling.
Phoebe Fox
#6. But long story short, I didn't start doing stand-up because I wanted to have a TV show or be an actor or even wanted to write sketch comedy. I got into stand-up because I love stand-up.
Demetri Martin
#7. As far as just my stand-up is concerned, I don't care about changing anyone's mind. I'm not making an argument. I'm a guy doing comedy.
David Cross
#8. I eventually became an actor, starting with doing stand-up comedy in New York and then theater wherever they would let me. Finally, I moved out here to Los Angeles and got on a show.
Nolan North
#9. After doing comedy for a while and knowing how hard it is to do physical comedy right, I learned how incredibly talented the Three Stooges really were after re-watching old episodes. They still stand up!
Carly Craig
#10. Georgia was a great place to live, but I wanted to get out because I knew the opportunities for what I was doing - stand-up comedy and eventually acting - were in Los Angeles.
Chris Tucker
#11. When I was in improv workshops or doing stand-up or writing comedy with others, or just doing comedy, I just laughed. Funny was funny; I loved to laugh. I always liked people I found generally funny.
Michael Keaton
#12. When I was 14, I told my mother I was going to drop out of high school and go do stand-up comedy. All she said was 'Oh maybe it's better if you just die,' because it was killing her that I was doing this.
Margaret Cho
#13. I never wanted to be a model. I never wanted to be a serious actress. I started off doing comedy. I did a stand-up comedy camp at the Laugh Factory, and I started out on Nickelodeon.
Amanda Bynes
#14. I have a work-out regime; I am not a maniac. It sounds cliche, but stand-up comedy, doing a one-man show, helps keep me young, and yes, it is exhausting, but I don't collapse.
Robert Klein
#15. I really don't want to do anything that resembles stand-up comedy. But I will agree to say that I am doing it, and I will hope that people expect it to be that, so I can thwart those expectations.
Lucas Neff
#16. I started doing stand-up at the age of 20. This was back in 1976, around the time (coincidence?) that the first comedy clubs were starting. The young comedians of today gasp when I tell them how many shows I did that first year: 500. Five nights a week.
Emo Philips
#17. I went from an unemployed actor's life to doing stand-up comedy, and that was fortuitous. It's not the usual way the crow flies, going from being in a TV sketch show to playing one of Shakespeare's finest characters, but, hey, that's the way it has happened.
Catherine Tate
#18. I think a lot comes from having the experience of doing stand-up comedy. It allows you to figure out the psychology of an audience; what things are funny and not.
Keenen Ivory Wayans
#19. I'm a stand-up comic. Anything else I do besides that is a plus, but stand-up comedy is what I do, it's what I've been doing and it's what I'm going to keep doing.
Dave Attell
#20. When I came on the scene, there was The Nualas, who were doing character comedy, but there weren't any other women doing stand-up because Michelle Read had gone more into theatre.
Deirdre O'Kane
#21. Those of you who are not aware of my brilliant career as a stand up comic, I'm not aware of it either so we might well wonder what we're doing here.
Alan Rickman
#22. I don't like doing things by halves, and I realised you can't do stand-up comedy part-time.
Deirdre O'Kane
#23. When you are doing stand-up comedy, you are the writer, producer, director, sometimes bouncer.
Dane Cook
#24. When I hit my 20s, I struggled to make it. I got married at 19, and my daughter, Je'Niece, was born a year later. I worked blue collar jobs during the day and comedy clubs at night, and I was earning about $25 a year doing stand-up.
Bernie Mac
#25. When I first started doing my stand-up act, I played the banjo, did comedy, magic tricks, juggled, read poetry. I stuck it all in. I didn't know you were supposed to just stand up and tell jokes. Essentially, that's what my act became: those five elements - except I dropped the poetry.
Steve Martin
#26. After graduation, I was floundering in L.A., doing stand-up comedy and working in a shoe store in the Valley.
Kevin Spacey
#27. The Comedy Store - all three rooms were filled with 800 people in the room. And during that time, all these guys and some women, but mostly guys who weren't funny were doing stand up for a living; they weren't accountants, they were making $30-$50 grand a year on the road, or more.
Bob Saget
#28. Doing stand-up comedy is in the middle of a traffic jam getting everybody moving again.
Jon Stewart
#29. I'm doing stand-up comedy. I'm working on a one-woman show about how I don't like my baby. There is a period of time where a baby is born where the next 3 months is harrowing. A lot of people say it's the most wonderful time, but for me it was harrowing.
Mary Lynn Rajskub
#30. I was very lucky when I started doing comedy because I hadn't seen much stand-up. I just got up on stage and did it without thinking.
Natasha Leggero
#31. I watch a happy person doing stand-up, and I go, "What the hell is this? This person's happy!" You need internal conflict. You need the guy to be out of step with society. It's a tool for comedy.
Zach Galifianakis
#32. Other than friends and family, my favorite things are New York and stand-up. I love doing comedy in New York - I can do way more stand-up here than in Los Angeles.
Aziz Ansari
#33. It's exciting to be able to do something completely independent without anybody challenging it, and it's a big part of the reason why I'm enjoying doing the stand-up comedy, is I'm able to go out and interact with people one-on-one after the show. It's very punk-rock.
Tom Green
#34. I'm a comedian, for God's sake. Viewers shouldn't trust me. And you know what? They're hip enough to know they shouldn't trust me. I'm just doing stand-up comedy.
Dennis Miller
#35. I'd been doing some light-beer commercials for Budweiser and Coors, and I was doing stand-up comedy. I wanted to get into the acting world, and my agent sent me on audition and they liked it.
Kevin Nealon
#36. I better start doing stand up comedy in Spanish before every comedian in Mexico translates my jokes.
Felipe Esparza
#37. I've been doing stand-up just about every night since I started in 1989. It's my home base. But I'm into doing comedy in all mediums, platforms and situations.
Judah Friedlander
#38. A lot of stand-up comedy is embarrassing: too many idiots doing it in orange neckties against brick walls. I find most sitcoms embarrassing, too, because they seem so forced.
Tracey Ullman
#39. I also want to return to doing stand-up. I've become frightened of live audiences. This is a really telling sign that I need to go back on the comedy circuit again.
Johnny Vegas
#40. I would watch either Michael Cera doing comedy or Louis CK doing stand-up. This would
James Altucher
Famous Authors
Popular Topics
Scroll to Top