Carl Reiner Quotes & Sayings

If you can get a laugh out of a name, you're ahead of the game. — Carl Reiner

It's like a bird. If he knew what he was doing, he would fall. — Carl Reiner

Id like to acknowledge three people who early on knew Mel Brooks was one of the funniest people in the world: Sid Caesar, me, and Mel Brooks. — Carl Reiner

People have a comic bent or an angularity to their thinking, and those are the people who make jokes. And it's usually people who were in an environment, when they were young, where jokes were at a premium, or at least considered important to a life. My parents always listened to the comedy radio shows, we went to the comedy movies, and my parents appreciated comedy. So kids listen and follow what their parents like. — Carl Reiner

I think that comedy really tells you how it is. The other thing about comedy is that - you don't even know if you're failing in drama, but you do know when you're failing in comedy. When you go to a comedy and you don't hear anybody laughing, you know that you've failed. — Carl Reiner

I only please myself. I figure I'm just one of many people. I'm not that different from anybody else and I don't have great language - I'm very ordinary. — Carl Reiner

The absolute truth is the thing that makes people laugh. — Carl Reiner

I'm a charming coward; I fight with words. — Carl Reiner

A lot of people like snow. I find it to be an unnecessary freezing of water. — Carl Reiner

When you denigrate people, they have two ways to fight back - with their fists and guns, or their mouths. And mouths are seemingly the easiest way to not get hit back. If people are laughing, they're not going to hit you. — Carl Reiner

Comedians are really writers who don't have pens and pencils about them, but they riff. — Carl Reiner

Lust is easy. Love is hard. Life is most important. — Carl Reiner

Everybody wants to laugh - you know that. They need to laugh ... people need to laugh. — Carl Reiner

Improvisation is just writing in front of an audience. — Carl Reiner

I certainly have warm relationships with people, but you choose the people you have those relationships with. There are some people I don't bother with. — Carl Reiner

Lust is easy, Love is hard, Like is the most important. — Carl Reiner

I was a Teletype operator in the army, so that's where I learned to type. One day, I went downstairs to see if I could still type - I hadn't done it for four or five years after the war. So I typed out a page and I showed it to my wife and she said, "Where did you get this?" I said I wrote it. "You wrote this?" It was something very funny. I went and wrote another page, another couple of pages, and by the time I was finished I had 13 little short stories, humorous short stories. — Carl Reiner

I am an atheist. I have a very different take on who God is. Man invented God because he needed him. God is us. — Carl Reiner

I'm not a believer, I call myself an atheist. It was man who invented God. I once wrote that there are 15 things I know about God, and one is that he is allergic to shellfish. There are far too many commandments and you really only need one: Do not hurt anybody. — Carl Reiner

An attitude will give you heft. — Carl Reiner

I've done everything I've wanted to do. I have three children, I have grandchildren, I have books, I did movies, I've directed movies, I've done almost everything I've wanted to do. — Carl Reiner

I'm an entertainer and I entertain people and they entertain me back by asking questions. And some of them I answer. — Carl Reiner

I write books that way - I put a first line down and say, "Where does this go?" — Carl Reiner

Inviting people to laugh with you while you are laughing at yourself is a good thing to do. You may be a fool but you're the fool in charge. — Carl Reiner

Writing is the basis of all, because creating something that didn't even exist before is like taking an empty canvass. It is a wonderful thing to make something out of nothing. You've got an empty page, you've got an idea, and then you start typing and that is the most thrilling thing of all. And then if it becomes a movie or something else that's a plus, but the original writing of it is what's very exciting. — Carl Reiner

I love tweeting. I tweet every day. I stay in contact, I tell them what I'm doing. I've posted pictures of my books on there and they buy the books. It's a very good way to communicate with people, but I can't go to bed without tweeting something. I have to tweet something. — Carl Reiner

My father was a watchmaker and an inventor. I saw him working in the house every day. The work ethic, I got from him. He worked hard and he never complained about it. — Carl Reiner

When I found out I could write I was shocked! I didn't know I could write. — Carl Reiner

You'd only write what you know and what you know is what you do and the people you know. So you'd write about them or the people you have met casually. It's part of your life. — Carl Reiner

A fellow who has a funny bone can learn to hone his skills, but I don't think you can develop a funny bone - you either have it or you don't. And by the way - when you get it, we don't know it. — Carl Reiner

Give yourself an impossible task and solve it - then you've got a really good story. — Carl Reiner