Zitate

I tend to stay up late, not because I'm partying but because it's the only time of day when I'm alone and I don't have to be on, performing.

Until Ace Ventura - Ein tierischer Detektiv (1994), no actor had considered talking through his ass.

[about his chances of winning at the 1998 Golden Globes Awards] It's insane . . . I mean, [Jack Nicholson], [Dustin Hoffman], [Samuel L. Jackson], [Kevin Kline]--I don't see how I can lose.

I've been dubbed the man most responsible for the dumbing of America, so obviously I don't put much stock into thoughts like (the theme of the 'dumbing down' of contemporary comedy). People love to laugh, and most people can find humor in just about anything, which is great. Trying to label or categorize comedy is ridiculous. I mean, if you laugh at a fart joke, does that make you a moron? I don't think so.

Maybe there is no actual place called hell. Maybe hell is just having to listen to our grandparents breathe through their noses when they're eating sandwiches.

That's the trouble with being me. At this point, nobody gives a damn what my problem is. I could literally have a tumor on the side of my head and they'd be like, 'Yeah, big deal. I'd eat a tumor every morning for the kinda money you're pulling down.

I'm charming, but I dip into the Prozac now and then.

I don't believe in this fairy tale of staying together for ever. Ten years with somebody is enough. In ten years, you can give a lot of love.

I have no intention of giving up my Canadian heritage, and all those who loved and supported me. My upbringing in Canada made me the person I am. I will always be proud to be a Canadian.

[after recording a cover of The Beatles' "I Am the Walrus"] There! I did it! I defiled a timeless work of art! For my next trick, I will paint a clown face on the Mona Lisa while using the shroud of Turin as a dropcloth.

[on being asked what his personal motto is] Always turn your wheel in the direction of the skid.

The power of the subconscious mind! With the power of the sub-conscious mind I can learn how to do anything...I could...learn how to dance, or, yodel like an Austrian.

If there'd been Ritalin when I was a kid, I wouldn't be here now.

The best possible thing you can get out of a relationship is that you're with somebody who encourages you to be the best version of yourself.

(1996, on choosing projects) Very rarely do I jump up and say on my own, 'I must do this!' I have a lot of people who look at material and give me their opinions. It's like the President-he doesn't make a move without his aides, which is a smart way to be if you trust the opinions of the people on your team.

(1996, on $20 million paydays) See, the number in the paper is one thing, but then there's 35 percent off the top for commissions, then there's taxes, so the $20 million check becomes $5.5 million. That's amazing money, but it's not $20 million. Believe me, I don't gloat about the money. People have lost fortunes that make mine look microscopic. You can never count on it for sure. People that do that are asking for trouble.

(1996) Money doesn't faze me at all. It goes into an account and then I basically do what I need to do with it. The money takes a little of your fear away-you know, fear of the future. This country is pretty scary if you don't build some kind of nest egg for yourself. I don't go buy Maseratis, because I've never been impressed with stuff like that at all. I'll probably end up with two houses, someplace to escape to and someplace in the city, I'm pretty basic. I understand the dynamic of people who medicate themselves with things, but it always seemed hollow to me.

(1996) I'm just a freak like the rest of us. I'd say I've had an even flow of neediness through my whole life, and I got kind of clever about it early. I remember starting out imitating records in the back of the classroom, and when the teacher singled me out and tried to make me feel embarrassed by saying, 'Get up and do that in front of the whole class,' it marked the end of all normal life. I got up, did it in front of the whole class and learned that committing myself to getting a reaction was very addicting. For sure, I have an unnatural need to be noticed or liked. But I don't necessarily gear everything to an audience, going, 'What are they going to want?', I'm not afraid to become a different thing, because I believe talent finds its audience. It's just like The Beatles. They didn't stay put. They changed, made a lot of enemies, lost fans, gained new ones.

(1996) I dyed my hair black just before I started shooting Cable Guy - Die Nervensäge (1996) and immediately got completely in the doldrums. I couldn't lift myself out of it, because every time I looked in the mirror, I didn't like myself. It definitely put me in a weird place.

Even if I am being over the top or crazy, I want to do something original. There is nothing that makes me happier than when someone says: 'I watched Die Maske (1994) 300 times when I was a kid.' I look forward to when I am 80 and people come up to me going: 'It was you, dude.' That's an amazing feeling.

It is as if I am starting out every time I make a film. And I swear to you I don't feel any more secure than I used to, or jaded in any way. There was a moment when I thought 'I am not sure I want to be part of this big thing that is Hollywood.' I looked at it cynically for a minute. Then I sat on my couch and realized the value of what I do. We free people from concern. It is what everyone needs in this day and age. There is nothing better and it started out that way.

I was always trying to make my mother laugh because she was sick or depressed or whatever. Many comics start out by trying to heal their family. That's how you get good. Your drunken grandparents leave and you turn around as a seven-year-old child and imitate them. That is how it began for me, bringing comic relief to my family. It really is comic relief, people don't just want to see it, they need it. I need it more than they do and that is why I am on this side of the camera because I am a really needy person.

(2001, on his first comedy show) My mother dressed me in a polyester suit, and I got booed off the stage, and I didn't go back for two years. But then when I went back, I was gangbusters.

My focus is to forget the pain, mock the pain, reduce it.

[on Ireland] I love the whole culture, obviously. You have the best musicians, the best poets. Great artists come out of Ireland.

These mass shootings and daily body counts are an invitation for us to become more civilized and to deal with our addiction and entitlement to violence. Not to shut our eyes and ears and scream at those with a different opinion than ours to 'fuck off and go back to Canada'.

So many of us chose our path out of fear disguised as practicality. My father could have been a great comedian, but he didn't believe that was possible for him. So, he made a conservative choice and instead he got a job as an accountant. When I was 12 years old, he was let go from that safe job. Our family had to do whatever we could to survive. I learned many great lessons from my father, not the least of which is that you can fail at what you don't want, so you might as well take a chance on doing what you love.

(Why he turned down Nicht auflegen! (2002)) I just wasn't in the right space to do that movie. I'd just come off Ich, beide & sie (2000) and Der Grinch (2000). I didn't want to go to a phone both and think about dying.

[on Jerry Lewis] People might dismiss Jerry as someone who acted the fool. But the fool is not an idiot.The courage and freedom of the fool liberates us. The fool tells the truth while making fun of our arrogance and our conventional ideas. He shows us up for what we are, and that's what Jerry did. He was a blessing.

[on the nuclear alert in Hawaii on January 13, 2018] It was a false alarm, but a real psychic warning. If we allow this one-man Gomorrah and his corrupt Republican congress to continue alienating the world, we are all headed for suffering beyond all imagination.

It's not our World.

[as a guest on Folge #16.26 (2018)] I grew up in Canada, OK. We have socialized medicine, and I am here to tell you that this bullshit line that you get on all the political shows from people, is that it's a failure; the system is a failure in Canada. It is NOT a failure in Canada. I never waited for anything in my life, I chose my own doctors, my mother never paid for a prescription. It was fantastic. And I just got back from Vancouver, and I keep hearing this, "Canadians are so nice . . . Canadians are so nice." They can be nice because they have health care. Because they have a government that cares about them. It doesn't say, "Sink or fucking swim pal, or you live in a box." There are certain people in our society that need to be taken care of. There are people without as many opportunities that need to be helped toward those opportunities. There are people who are sick. You shouldn't have to lose your home because your mother got sick.

With vaccines being the fastest growing division of the pharmaceutical industry, isn't it possible that profits may play a part in the decision-making? That the vaccine program is becoming more of a profit engine than a means of prevention? In a world left reeling from the catastrophic effects of greed, mismanagement and corporate insensitivity, is it so absurd for us to wonder why American children are being given twice as many vaccines on average, compared to the top 30 first world countries?

I feel that we're all lighthouses, and my job is to shine my light as brightly as I can to the darkness.

[2017, on not accepting sequels]: I find sequels are a function of commerce for the most part. At least the two I've done, they were characters I enjoyed doing, but I did find myself almost parroting myself at that point. When you put 10 years between you and the last time you did it, suddenly you're going, 'How did I do that again?' So, you're imitating your original inspiration. It was super fun with Jeff, but I'm not a crazy sequel guy.