Omid Djalili

“You can tell I'm a very, very British person, but I've kept my roots quite strong. I still speak Farsi.”

“My cut-off line is, you don't make fun of the prophet founders of a religion. That would just alienate people. But you can make fun of the foibles of people who follow a religion; Muslims or Jews. You can do that in a positive way.”

“Anything Rowan Atkinson touched turned to gold. His timing was impeccable and there seemed to be a deep intelligence behind what he was doing.”

“I'm a Baha'i. I'm not a Muslim. I'm Baha'i. And the Baha'i faith is such a sweet faith.”

“There's so much terrible stuff in the clubs: you see audience's minds being polluted by awful language and base thoughts. But perhaps some people think that about my comedy.”

“Being able to deliver a great set up is just as important as being able to deliver a punchline.”

“I'm naturally more of an actor - I'm not saying I'm very good, but it's what I trained for.”

“I've always done tours, and just as I thought I was getting good, the tour stopped.”

“Where I find it very difficult to get comedy from and where I naturally don't go is human suffering.”

“I find with a 400-seater, there's something much more focused about it. I've never really had a bad gig in a 400-seat venue.”

“Any actor in musicals would probably want to play Fagin or maybe Tevye in 'Fiddler on the Roof'.”

“If I've got to carry this bit of fat around my stomach for the rest of my life, then I apologise to my pallbearers. I'll be heavy when they carry my coffin.”

“I understand the power of words and ideas as I get older and as I become more responsible as a stand-up. I think the media can really help by changing that syntax and vernacular.”

“Every time something happens in the Middle East, my phone goes off with radio stations wanting to ask my opinion, but I don't always want to give it and it's probably not always seemly either.”

“I go for coffee with my wife every day.”

“Britain and America are always kind of at war with the Middle East in some way. And you've got Omid Djalili who is clearly an Iranian and very proud of his heritage, yet he is a very unique voice. He kind of belongs to Britain because he had a BBC show, but at the same time he hasn't rejected his Middle Eastern roots.”

“I usually get called misogynistic, usually by women, and what do they know? They're not even men.”

“My greatest ambition is to wake up every morning and not crave a full English breakfast.”

“When people know there's going to be something silly they allow you the space to be political.”

“If you're doing a film, the smallest nuance is so big on screen, so you have to learn to control your face.”