What is comedy? Comedy is the art of making people laugh without making them puke.
Interpretation
Comedy is a form of art that aims to amuse people while maintaining a level of tastefulness.
In this quote, Steve Martin emphasizes that comedy should evoke laughter in a way that does not offend or disgust the audience. The essence of comedy lies in balancing humor and propriety, ensuring that laughter brings joy rather than discomfort.
In practice
This quote could be used in a comedy class to spark discussion about the boundaries of humor.
When I first started doing my comedy act, I just desperately needed material. So I took literally everything I knew how to do on stage with me, which was juggling, magic and banjo and my little comedy routines. I always felt the audience sorta tolerated the serious musical parts while I was doing my comedy.
You want to be a bit compulsive in your art or craft or whatever you do.
I have heard it said that a complicated childhood can lead to a life in the arts. I tell you this story of my father and me to let you know I am qualified to be a comedian.
...it is not the big events that hurt the most but rather the smallest questionable shift in tone at the end of a spoken word that can plow most deeply into the heart.
Reviews for someone like me come in three packages. One is justifiable praise, the second is justifiable criticism, and the third is, "This is only published because he's a celebrity."
If he thinks he would harm Mirabelle, he would back away. But he does not yet understand when and how people are hurt. He doesn't understand the subtleties of slights and pains, that it is not the big events that hurt the most but rather the smallest questionable shift in tone at the end of a spoken word that can plow most deeply into the heart.
You don’t want to ask after the health of anyone, if you’re a funeral director. They think maybe you’re scouting for business.
I know of only six genuine comic geniuses in movie history; Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, Groucho Marx & Harpo Marx, Peter Sellers, and W.C. Fields.
In the words of the philosopher Sceptum, the founder of my profession: am I going to get paid for this?
We don't apologize for a joke. We are comics. We are here to make you laugh. If you don't get it, then don't watch us.
People think I'm a very serious actor, which I am. But you know, if you don't have a sense of humor doing what I do, you perish.
I'm going to take this God-given gift of being funny, and I'm going to spread it out like peanut butter on everything I do.
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