A biography for Jerry Lewishasn’t been written yet.
“You see, the people that have a point of view and have an opinion and have some intellect are dangerous in the film community - they're dangerous.”
“Gambling is part of the human condition. I love it. I have the best time gambling. I've been winning fortunes, and I've been losing them.”
“If I found the cure for dystrophy tomorrow, I would do a telethon in four weeks for acute pain that in this country is a bigger problem than cancer, heart, sickle cell, anemia, name it. It is - it's hitting 70 million Americans.”
“What happens at 90 is that I don't walk so good, my eyes are going, I can't hear well, and I'm getting all of the 90s residuals.”
“Every day is another something that comes along.”
“You can ask me anything you want. That doesn't mean I'm going to answer you.”
“I'm always thinking about future projects and at the same time trying to finish the project you're in the middle off.”
“I've had great success being a total idiot.”
“The film I did with Bobby De Niro, 'The King of Comedy' - an awful lot came to me out of that movie because De Niro never allowed me any room to be crazy. If I had tried to play it the way I would normally play it and get hysterical, Bobby would punch me.”
“When I was onstage doing the work, adrenaline killed the pain because I never hurt in front of an audience.”
“A woman doing comedy doesn't offend me, but sets me back a bit. I, as a viewer, have trouble with it. I think of her as a producing machine that brings babies in the world.”
“Don't you understand how dramatic it is to be a comic? To be a fool, to get people to laugh at this show-off? Milton Berle could take Laurence Olivier and stick him under the table if he wanted to. And so could I.”
“That never stops. That's what drives you: the joy and excitement of doing what you love.”
“I'm shocked to be saying this, but as a child, I never went to a circus. It cost too much.”
“For a comic to put a public performance in jeopardy for a snickering little laugh - no, no, no, I don't believe in it.”
“The people at Columbia Pictures have been great, but I had to tell them, 'Please don't be nice to me. Just pay me.'”
“When I get an idea, I start to write like I was electrically motivated.”
“When I'm working, I stay in ICU in any hospital that will get me a bed.”
“God hadn't made me handsome, but he'd given me something, I always felt: funny bones.”
“I don't talk about anything negative.”