A biography for Paul Mertonhasn’t been written yet.
“At one point in the mid-Eighties I shared a promoter with the Smiths. One night, we were sitting backstage when Morrissey burst in, utterly distraught, sobbing his heart out. Turns out someone had thrown a sausage at him on stage during 'Meat Is Murder.'”
“The thing about improvisation is that it's not about what you say. It's listening to what other people say. It's about what you hear.”
“The economics favour one-man comedy shows: all you need is one person, a microphone and a PA system. But I'm pleased so many people are making a living out of comedy - it's a wonderful business to be in.”
“Am I allowed to call myself working-class now? Because obviously I'm now very rich.”
“In fact, I don't watch a lot of contemporary comedy for fear of being influenced by it.”
“If you became a comedian in the '80s, you had to work the circuit and make people laugh. Canned laughter is cheating.”
“I read every book about Buster Keaton and Chaplin to see how they worked - it's all about dedication, tunnel vision, pursuit of perfection, getting the gag right.”
“When I wake up on a Monday morning and I realise I don't have to go and work at the civil service, I really think I've won.”
“I was trying to organise my DVDs into a sort of chronological order, and I am afraid that it all trailed off after the Sixties.”
“I've never been disappointed by politicians. I've never invested that much in them in the first place.”
“When I was nine I spent a lot of my time reading books about the history of comedy, or listening to the Goons or Hancock, humour from previous generations.”
“When I turned about 12 or 13, I realised that being funny wasn't about remembering jokes. It was about creating them.”
“It was a bizarre existence I led in my early twenties - that cliche of the comedian who goes out and entertains a roomful of people and then goes home to a lonely bedsit was unbelievably poignant for me because that was exactly what I was doing. I had periods of real loneliness.”
“I have never sold my story, done 'Hello!' magazine, any of that stuff. I'm not guilty of exploiting my private life for cash and then saying, 'Oh, I don't want to talk about my private life.' I've never crossed that line.”
“On my first day in New York a guy asked me if I knew where Central Park was. When I told him I didn't he said, 'Do you mind if I mug you here?'.”
“In a psychiatric hospital, a lot of people believe that people on TV are talking to them directly through the screen. I'm with about 500 of these people, and I'm on TV every Friday night. As I was queuing up for breakfast one morning, one guy nearly jumped out of his skin. My first thought was to go 'Woooo!'”
“I really don't take any interest at all in contemporary comedy.”
“All disc jockeys are without talent. Noel Edmonds - I can't stand Noel Edmonds.”
“It seems like a contradiction, but the shy person who is a performer actually does make sense, because in a way, when you're young and shy, making people laugh is a good way to make friends. It's an instant connection.”
“I remember being fascinated by the very nature of comedy from the age of 10; why is this funny, and that isn't?”