Buddy Hackett

“A comedian sees the world bent. I'm tangent to the circle.”

“A comic, you have to be looking down at him. My favorite rooms, the audience is above the stage, stadium-style.”

“As a child my family's menu consisted of two choices: take it or leave it.”

“I've had a good day when I don't fall out of the cart.”

“You want to know what makes me tick, I'll tell you what makes me tick. I was a boy growing up in Brooklyn; I read a two-penny magazine called 'The Hawk's Nest.' Nobody entered that nest that didn't leave a little richer and a little wiser. And that 11-year-old boy said, 'Isn't that a wonderful thing.' And that's all there is to it.”

“I was born to be funny.”

“I have the gift of laughter. I can make people laugh at will. In good times and in bad. And that I don't question. It was a gift from God.”

“I found out that if you made people laugh, they like you. Most people got to like me because I made them laugh. When they didn't, I hit them.”

“At the Sahara, the seats are banked and most of the audience is looking down at the stage. Everybody in the business knows: Up for singers, down for comics. The people want to idealize a singer. They want to feel superior to a comic. You're trying to make them laugh. They can't laugh at someone they're looking up to.”

“My mother's menu consisted of two choices: Take it or leave it.”

“You look up at drama, down at comedy. A singer, looking up is okay. A comic, it's death.”

“I used to like to dig myself a hole just to see how long it took to get out of it.”

“Ninety-nine percent is in the delivery. If you have the right voice and the right delivery, you're cocky enough, and you pound down on the punch line, you can say anything and make people laugh maybe three times before they realize you're not telling jokes.”

“When I do an hour-and-a-half show, if I don't improvise 20 minutes worth of new material each night, I feel I've let myself down.”

“Golf is more fun than walking naked in a strange place, but not much.”

“I've had a few arguments with people, but I never carry a grudge. You know why? While you're carrying a grudge, they're out dancing.”

“What makes a comedian has nothing to do with religion. Think of Red Skelton, Jimmy Durante, Jackie Gleason, who were all Catholics.”

“There have always been mixed emotions about Howard Cosell: Some people hate him like poison, and other people just hate him regular.”

“I'm an actor. I want to do drama.”

“If you have the right voice and the right delivery, you're cocky enough, and you pound down on the punch line, you can say anything and make people laugh maybe three times before they realize you're not telling jokes.”