Colin Quinn Quotes

Everybody’s funny in different ways.

I think I identify more with the smart guy, but most people might take umbrage at that. I like to think of myself as a real thinker, but I suppose people might beg to differ.

The ancient Greeks were the first ones to say an unexamined life is not worth living. They don’t tell you of course what we found out, an examined life not that fascinating either.

I think people tend to feel odd when I do my act. Unless you are an ironic person, it’s not a good place for you to be.

Stand-up is live, so I’m used to being live for most of my career. It’s interesting.

You know, the funny thing about Lorne and that show is that, you can go over one million things, but in a business of bean counters, he still likes to laugh at small things and creates a show around it.

I’m just another guy who thinks he’s smarter than he is, in a long line of them.

I’ve been to Japan, I’ve been to China, I’ve been to Africa, I’ve been to the Middle East, I’ve been to Europe a little bit. I’ve never been to South America.

I feel most empires fell when they started to act human, but then look at Russia. They kept a pretty strong hand, and they fell from Afghanistan alone because Afghanistan is the graveyard of empires. I guess you just can’t sustain it.

I’m quietly becoming New York‘s premiere actor. People don’t understand. They have me pigeon-holed as a comedian.

I would say most comedians have a very cynical worldview of the way the world can work. It’s almost like if you didn’t, you couldn’t be a comedian.

I write all the time – I write poetry, I love to write.

My stand-up act? I combine the fact that the world is a violent place with the fact that each person is responsible for the situation they are in.

My name has zero value.

You can’t make everybody laugh. You gotta just do what you think is funny. Just be obstreperous to everybody.

He is very dry but also very funny… I think people tend to feel odd when I do my act. Unless you are an ironic person, it’s not a good place for you to be.

Everybody says before reviews come out, ‘Oh, reviews don’t matter,’ just in case they’re bad; everyone want to brace themselves.

People’s – most people’s job is talking about the future or like money not even in the present tense. It’s not even paper.

I love people, I love studying people more than history. So whatever situation I see, then I look at, what were the people like, more than history itself.

I was a class clown.

I think Helen of Troy must have been pretty hot. She got two countries going crazy for 10 years over her.

Marie Antoinette was funny, I’m sure she was just misinterpreted. You know the ‘Let them eat cake‘ line. She seems like she was kind of funny, like a Chelsea Handler or Kathy Griffin type.

The thing that drives me crazy is when comics say ‘I have low self-esteem.’ No you don’t. You’re standing on stage asking people to pay. You don’t play an instrument. You want people to pay to hear what’s in your mind. You don’t have low self-esteem. You might have other problems.

You can’t make money on Broadway. You make nothing. You maybe make like $1,350 a week after you pay out all the producers.

I don’t know any comedian who tailors his act to his audience. Maybe people say they do, but I can’t even imagine them.

The mistake that people make in stand-up is thinking they’re profound or they’re deep when there are so many people who have more worthwhile ways of phrasing things.

If I had to give up everything else and keep just one aspect of the job, I’d have to keep writing because I love it. Yes, I enjoy performing, too. But I couldn’t give up writing material.

Those early days of comedy are when you get addicted to it.

Everybody’s got a different sense of humor. It’s just different styles.

So instead of talking about theoretical ways of ending the war and violence, I say that we have to get rid of the individual asholes in each office and situation.