Paul F. Tompkins: How do you separate that feeling of rejection as an artist from you as a person? Its like, “Well no, they don’t like me or what I do.”
Aisha Tyler: Yes, both. Did you have a point where… Cause I remember vividly having a couple of points where I was like, “Why do I do this?”
PFT: Oh, very recently. I just came out of it where I was at a really bad point, and even some good things were happening and I couldn’t see it.
AT: You can’t even feel that.
PFT: I was able to turn it into a negative, “Yeah, but its not… this, you know?” And ‘this’ hasn’t happened yet. And you know all that kind of thing.
AVC: Do you find your act has changed dramatically since you started?
Kyle Kinane: Oh for sure, man. Everything’s got to grow if you’re a human being. I was doing one-liner stuff when I started, because when you start at an open mic you only have five minutes so you’ve got to get as many jokes as you can in there. Now, everybody’s like, “Oh, you’re a storyteller.” No, I ... just got thrown into headlining earlier than maybe I was ready. Suddenly, I had to do 45 minutes, so I was like, “All right, well I’m going to draw out some of these jokes into full stories.” I think they’re working, but with some of them it’s like, “Wow, you’re just talking out of your ass with that thing.” You definitely get to dive into stuff with the storytelling. But if somebody doesn’t like something two minutes in, it’s like, “All right, well this is a 12-minute-long story. If you don’t like it now, who knows if you’ll like it in 10 minutes.” It’s not everybody’s cup of tea, but nothing should be everybody’s cup of tea.
The A.V. Club Toronto Interview: Kyle Kinane / By Phil Brown December 8, 2011
Larry King: Tough audience?
Roseanne Barr: No, they were just awesome. It's funny how I did it because I had stage fright to do stand-up, so I put in a — in order to like force myself to do stand-up I put in a part of my act where I take my clothes off because I'm like, "If you think this is bad, wait until you take your clothes off." That's how I kind of like tricked myself over my fear and stuff plus meditation.
But then after the taking your clothes off, I come out and I say, I say "Dancing in my underwear is nothing compared to the fear of singing in public, which I'm about to overcome now." So, it's like I have to trick myself to do stand-up. I have to like do my other worst fears, dancing in my underwear and singing a song but I don't know why it works.
LK: You're still a little nuts right?
RB: Yes, I know I am but you could get your mental illness and stuff to work for you. You could actually direct it and get it to work for you.
LK: That's right, take it and let it -- use it you can...
RB: Yes, because I do have a lot of fear of people and being in public and, you know, I have a lot of fear period but I just like try to always overcome my fear and for some reason that works for me.
CNN LARRY KING LIVE / Interview With Roseanne Barr / Aired March 2, 2006 - 21:00 ET
Nobody, I swear, ever had it in his bones like Dean (Martin) had. My dad used to agree with me. Danny Lewis worked with strait men all through his career. Good ones. But nobody could touch Dean.
George Burns saw us at the Sands in the mid-fifties, and said to me over dinner one night, "He's the greatest strait man I've ever seen."
George Burns! Who lived through all the two-acts—Smith and Dale. Olsen and Johnson. Gallager and Shean.
Not to mention Burns and Allen.
George used to tell the classic self-deprecating joke about strait men—namely, that all you really had to do to hold up your end was repeat what the comic said. If the comic says, "I lost my shoes," you say, "You lost your shoes?" George joked, "It's terrible, because I was at the beach, and there was a kid in the water yelling 'help-help-help', and I yelled 'help-help-help?' And by the time I got to him, he drowned."
George was so much better than that, of course. And George thought Dean was the greatest of them all.
Nathan Rabin: You also were an entertainer at a 7-year-old's birthday party at least once. Care to elaborate on that?
Conan O'Brien: It was horrible. Bombed. Completely bombed. Those kids were assholes. They didn't know quality when they saw it. A friend of mine and I who was a fellow improviser, a guy I knew at the Groundlings Theatre, he came to me, he said, "Hey, I got this gig to entertain at a kid's party, and they're paying, and it's cash, man." It sounded like a drug deal. "It's cash, and they want us to go there. We got to work fast." So we went there and we had guitars and pranced around. It was classic. The kids were like Easter Island statues. They just stared at us. I think the mom who had hired us was just like, "What is this crap?" We were doing weird characters and stuff. I think we got paid, but it was one of those things where they pay you grudgingly. You almost wish they didn't pay you. They really despise you. Not good. People say all experience is good—not true. That was a complete waste of time, and humiliating. If I could get into a time machine, I wouldn't use it to save Abraham Lincoln's wife, or cure polio a little earlier. I'd use it to wipe out that birthday.
The A.V. Club Interview: Conan O'Brien / By Nathan Rabin / August 30, 2006
Dave Davies: But I gather ‘the ball’ wasn’t so much fun for you? (referring to being a cast member on Saturday Night Live at age 21)
Julia Louis-Dreyfus: Yeah, it wasn’t that great.
DD: Why not?
JLD: Well, I was very young. Okay, and I was very, very naïve. And I was coming from college and doing theater work with my friends and we would all work really hard as an ensemble to make the best possible show so there was a sort of an earnestness that I took with me to doing SNL that really had no place. I didn’t understand the politics and the dynamics of the show. I also went in thinking that I would just work with writers and you know, you just sort of… I didn’t go in with characters that I had worked and worked and worked on. I was not a writer myself. I was somewhat unprepared. Larry David was there my third year… he was a writer on that show for my last year and it was his only year. And we became friends during that period of time and we sort of… he was miserable. He didn’t get a single sketch on… he did get one sketch on but it was cut between dress and air. And so we sort of bonded in misery and there you go.
DE: And that’s what led to Seinfeld, right?
JLD: Yeah, pretty much. I mean there was a period of time in between, but yeah, it did.
Julia Louis-Dreyfus: From 'Seinfeld' To 'Veep' / NPR Fresh Air Weekend / Interview by Dave Davies / May 5, 2012
Eric Eisenberg: With all the films that you’ve directed, produced, written and starred in, and all the nominations and awards you’ve received, is there one film that’s the most memorable for you?
Woody Allen: When you make the film, it’s like a chef who works on the meal. After you’re working all day in the kitchen, dicing and cutting and putting the sauces on, you don’t want to eat it. That’s how I always feel about the films. I work on it for a year. I’ve written it, I’ve worked with the actors, I’ve edited it and put the music in, and I just never want to see it again. When I begin a film, I always think that I’m going to make The Bicycle Thief or Grand Illusion or Citizen Kane, and I’m convinced that it’s going to be the greatest thing to ever hit celluloid. And then, when I see what I’ve done afterward, I pray that it’s not an embarrassment to me. I’ve never been satisfied or even pleased with a film that I’ve done. I make them, but I’ve never looked at one after.
I made my first film in 1968, and I’ve never seen it since. I just cringe when I see them. I don’t like them ‘cause there’s a big gap between what you conceive in your mind when you’re writing and having to meet the test of reality. You write and it’s funny and beautiful and romantic and dramatic, and then you have to show up on a cold morning, and the actors are there and you’re there, and you don’t have enough of this and this goes wrong and you make the wrong choice on something and you screw up here. When you see what you get the next day, you can’t go back. There’s such a difference between the idealized film in your mind and what you wind up with that you’re never happy and you’re never satisfied. For me, I’ve never liked any of my films. I’m always thankful that the audience has liked some of them, in spite of my disappointment.
Woody Allen Explains Why Annie Hall And Hannah And Her Sisters Were Disappointments / by Eric Eisenberg / cinemablend.com / June 22, 2012
