Quotes & Sayings About Acting Funny

It's funny because I've resisted acting as a career for most of my life. But both my parents told me if I ever want to direct, I should act first because no director should direct until they know what it's like to be in the actor's shoes. — Dylan Penn

The funny thing is, because I was doing a lot of theater when I was a kid, and a lot of that was musical theater, as I got older I became more interested in acting as a separate entity and music as a separate entity, like songwriting and production and recording and playing music. — Guy Pearce

Now that I'm more mature, in a funny way, I can even appreciate that I've bad to become more aware of my body. Since I've chosen acting as my career, I have to keep my weight down anyway-I've been used to it for years, so it's no problem. And there's nothing I can't do. — Dana Hill

On some level in acting, what you're trying to find is truth, because when it's true is when it's also funny. — David Hyde Pierce

I dream of acting with Kevin Costner. I would love to do a movie with him. Not something funny, but a dramatic role. — Bill Engvall

SHUT UP," Carot Top say, the cocane now taking effect. "This isnt Poetry 101. People want to laugh. Your suposed to be a 'King' of Prop Comedy. But youve been acting more like a jester of prop comedy. — Seinfeld 2000

The door to the situation room door opened, drawing her attention to a tall, lean man with eyes as sharp as razors.
The sound of a metal chair scraping on the tile floor filled the room as Reed shot to his feet, stood at attention, and saluted crisply.
The man stopped, scowled, and heaved a heavy sigh. "All right you clown. At ease. It hasn't been that long since I've been here."
"Just showing my respect, sir," Reed said with a smart-ass grin. "It's not often we're fortunate enough to be in the company of such greatness. — Cindy Gerard

Every time I walk by a spy shop, I think that I need to put some surveillance on somebody. Rick's been acting fishy! I need to buy a safe that looks like a Spray 'N Wash can. "Hey, Mitch, can I use the Spray 'N Wash?" "Yeah, if you want to spray your shirt with documents!" — Mitch Hedberg

I am always acting, be at a party, at work or in office. My attitude changes from meeting to meeting, from being serious to intense to funny, depending on who is in the room. — Karan Johar

In a funny way, acting, to me, is all make-believe, even if the film has unicorns in it or is a normal movie that can be set in real-life time. I'm still imagining that I'm a different character, so it's all, in a funny way, like fantasy. — Elle Fanning

There are some situations from which one can only escape by acting like a devil or a lunatic. — George Orwell

Acting is an empty and usless profession. — Marlon Brando

It's true; I have a skill and it's ... it has not related to acting, it's not related to auditions, it's not related to studios, not related to public whim. It's whether I'm funny or not and whether I can entertain people. — Tim Allen

The special effects team designed everything, which basically allowed me to stand on a green box and look and stay relatively expressionless and all these machines did the acting for me. Just the way I like it (laughs) — Robert Pattinson

A lot of times, as a clown, you find acting for a reason. It's a way to exercise yourself. If you're funny, you test yourself. — Matthew Lillard

With acting, it [auditioning] is very frustrating. I'm not very good at auditions. Sometimes I audition for a role and I'm like, I'd be really funny in that role, but I'm not good at auditions so I guess I'm not getting that role. It's a very frustrating job. — Jim Jefferies

No, I always wanted to be a singer. It was kind of funny that I took this road, started acting, then-almost ten years later-in Wayne's World people finally got to see me sing. And everyone thought it was dubbed in. — Tia Carrere

It's weird, I love acting and stand-up is a very unique, solitary thing where you are the writer, performer and director. But acting is incredibly rewarding, working and interacting with people to create funny moments. I can't imagine not doing acting or stand-up, I really enjoy both of them that much. — Jim Gaffigan

It's funny the more technological advanced everything gets, the more like acting in your bedroom when you're a kid it is. — Michael Sheen

Not that they were that anxious to see Ronnie as President; they were afraid if he didn't get elected, he'd go back to acting. — Bob Hope

It's funny - when I started acting, I didn't know I was going to be talking about Asian-American issues so much. You know what, though? It just comes with the territory, being ethnic. — Justin Chon

What are you doing?"
"I'm, uh, acting normal."
"No you're not. You're acting like someone pretending to be normal. Stop pretending and start acting, but don't act like you're not pretending, that'll make it worse. — Derek Landy

As a child, one of my defense mechanisms was to try to be funny. My mom tried to nurture that by putting me in acting class. But I got bored when we stopped pretending to be trees and actually had to work. — Ian Gomez

I had some good friends - really funny ones. My best friend was a guy called Apolo Nsibambi. We shared an office at the Extra Mural Department at Makerere, and then I got a promotion - became Acting Director - and I was his boss! I used to tease him for calling himself "Doctor" - he had a Ph. D. in political science. I mocked him for wearing a tie and carrying a briefcase and being pompous. I went to his wedding. He came to my wedding. And then I completely lost touch with him. I wonder what happened to him.' 'Doctor Nsibambi is the Prime Minister of Uganda. — Paul Theroux

Acting is easier and smoother than singing - it's less drama. — Beyonce Knowles

He forced himself forward trying to seem innocent without acting like someone who was guilty who was trying to act innocent. — James Dashner

I'm a bug on acting, which distinguishes Second City from a lot of other revues. It comes from the character, the behavior, and not from the jokes. I don't think jokes are funny. Humor comes out of character and out of situations the character is in. — Bernard Sahlins

You try to live straight in this crazy, crooked, mixed-up world - that's what's funny. You know what I mean?"
"I do, I do," I said.
"You don't even have to do anything especially funny. You just act normal. That alone looks strange and funny. Acting like that interests me. — Haruki Murakami

When I was a kid, I wanted to be serious, like Daniel Day-Lewis. No one really dreams of being a comic actor, do they? Now I realise how stupid that is - and it's because comic acting isn't taken seriously enough. It's a discipline. You know instantly - either you're funny and getting the laughs, or you're not. — Chris O'Dowd

Tris," he says. "What did they do to you? You're acting like a lunatic."
"That's not very nice of you to say," I say. "They put me in a good mood, that's all. And now I really want to kiss you, so if you could just relax- — Veronica Roth

Some lucky people can be funny without half trying because they actually look funny, because acting funny is in their bones - fun as funny, not funny as crude slapstick. — F. Sionil Jose

The idea that it is funny to see wild animals coerced into acting like clumsy humans, or thrilling to see powerful beasts reduced to cringing cowards by a whip-cracking trainer is primitive and medieval. It stems from the old idea that we are superior to other species and have the right to hold dominion over them. — Desmond Morris

The magic that confounds them is humanity. The naturally occurring, slow acting, unpredictably potent product of conscious minds connecting. These madmen want to synthesise love. They want to manufacture it, weaponise it, and use it to control people. It's such a ludicrous scheme it would be funny if they weren't trampling the world in pursuit of it. — Isaac Marion

It was only when I went to acting school that I was like, "You are absolutely such a pigheaded freak show that you thought you, at the age of 12 or 13, could have a better understanding of Stanislavski. Why did you think that you didn't need to go to school?" It was quite funny. But, I was certainly inspired. — Giles Matthey

When I was in high school, I was a bad singer. I mean, all my early acting was musical theater, and my first ever show was 'Jesus Christ Superstar.' Everyone's familiar with it. I played priest number 3 and sang so out of tune that it's not even funny. — Sam Claflin

She didn't need to go to acting school to learn that the essence of acting is to act like you're not acting. — George Burns

I don't laugh so much at jokes and premises as I do at a guy who goes onstage and starts twitching and acting funny. — Harland Williams

I owe my whole acting career to the fact that I'm a singer. I went out to Los Angeles and auditioned for a TV show called 'Fame L.A.' The original role was for a comedian, but they said I wasn't very funny, so they asked me, 'What else can you do?' So I played a singer. — Christian Kane

So two atoms of Helium were acting all funny ... Hehe — Na

It's a funny thing. You sort of never figure it out with acting. You're always learning. — Paul Dano

In high school, I got picked on. It's funny that I got tormented for what I'm doing now - the acting thing. People would see me in a Nickelodeon commercial, and I would hear about it the next day at school. Kids would say, 'Hi, TV Boy.' They heckled. I never got beat up. — Jason Biggs

In acting you do a lot of research. Audience watch Jet Li because of the fight. They watch other actors because they are funny. If they want funny, they don't want to see Jet Li, they watch the other guy. That's the reality I face, until the one day I can prove I can make film without action that is a fun movie. Then everybody will say Jet Li, hmmm. — Jet Li

Are you a female dog?"
"What?" Massie asked. "Why?"
"Because you are acting like a real bitch! — Lisi Harrison

I don't know. I don't really like old movies. The acting is so, 'Hey buddy, ol' pal. Let's go wear our hats and have a big misunderstanding — Stephanie Perkins

You're starting to look like you did before, and that's not good because what you looked like was complete shit, so get up and go to bed so I can stop acting like your mother. I can already feel my balls starting to recede. And hey, does it look like I'm growing breasts? - Kye — Krista Alasti

It's upsetting that it is such a big deal. I wish it weren't an issue all the time. It's funny that people say it's a departure, because I've been acting since I was a child. I've played three gay roles out of hundreds. — Randy Harrison

I just think it's really funny and entertaining. I mean, I don't necessarily take them really seriously - I don't even think a lot of really good films get seen. But I don't think that's what it's about. I mean, how amazing was Ellen Burstyn in Requiem For A Dream ? Especially as she was acting with herself most of the time. I don't understand how a performance like that can't win. I was so affected by that movie that I had to turn it off. I felt as if I was on drugs and my heart was about to leap out of my body. — Liv Tyler

I did a lot of serious plays, and I did the Oxford Review as well, which is supposed to be funny, but I'm not sure how funny we were when we did it. Then, when I finished my course, it was only then that I decided to go to drama school and try and do acting because I was enjoying it so much and so on. — Katherine Parkinson

I think the funny thing about acting for me - and I hold it in a very holy, spiritual way - not to be overly fundamentalist about it, but it's that important to me - is that it is an ancient healing art. — Melissa Leo

It's funny to think that when you get done with an acting job, you're considered unemployed. There are definitely times when those checks don't last forever. I went to college at a private school, and I racked up quite a bit of debt. I was very slow to pay them back. — Rami Malek

Kissing on screen is just, funny enough you're just acting so you're distracted by that more than anything. Or at least I am. I'm actually always coming away from those things going like, 'I wonder how I kissed just now.' Because I have no idea! I'm just thinking about what's happening. — Dylan O'Brien

This is going to sound cheesy, but with acting there are so many tools. When you're on camera, you're using all of it. You're using the voice, you're using your body, you're using wardrobe, all of it, but it's funny, once you take all of those things away, you realize how much you rely on the physicality. — Jennifer Stone

Immature citizens in several sizes were massed before a large factorylike structure where advanced techniques transformed them into true-thinking right-acting members of the three social classes, lower, middle, and upper middle. — Donald Barthelme

It is really funny to see people that you know acting unpleasantly just because there are TV cameras on. — Penn Jillette

I don't know how to be like a Bill Murray or a Will Ferrell, these guys who know how to make a line funny just by, I don't know, some extra-sense perception. I only know character and emotion and real acting; that's all I know how to do. — John C. Reilly

I've been called a funny person, for a long time. I don't know that I know anything about comedic acting. I'm not a good improver, which is what a lot of comedic actors are really good at. I have failed miserably when I've been asked to improvise. — John Cho

It's because his wife left him. That's why he's acting funny. She left him the other night. While she was putting her bags into the taxi he was outside on the footpath begging her to stay. On his knees! Why are men so embarrassing?
Bev — Louis Nowra

Different scenes call for different acting styles. The kinds of scenes I like most are the ones where you just bury yourself in there. So I wouldn't say that's the only way to be funny, but that's my favorite way to play stuff, to try to put myself in a situation where that kind of acting is necessary. — Will Forte

That's what acting is about, Funny wigs and voices, that's what we do. — Cillian Murphy

The mind likes a strange idea as little as the body likes a strange protein and resists it with similar energy. It would not perhaps be too fanciful to say that a new idea is the most quickly acting antigen known to science. If we watch ourselves honestly we shall often find that we have begun to argue against a new idea even before it has been completely stated. — Wilfred Trotter

Max, you're acting like a child, the Voice said. You're above rebelling against your fate just to rebel. You've got a date with destiny. Don't be late.
I brushed some hair out of my eyes. Is that a movie quote? Or is it an actual date? I don't remember destiny asking me. I never even gave destiny my phone number. — James Patterson

She was acting funny, like she was . . . I couldn't tell. I had trained myself to read visual cues from people I knew well, so that I could tell what they were feeling, but someone like Brooke was illegible to me. — Dan Wells

That's what I think works the best, and what I think makes the best comedy - something that's completely committed and more approached as an acting exercise, as opposed to being worried about whether to be funny or not. The comedy comes from the context. — Will Ferrell

One of the things I like about acting is that, in a funny way, I come back to myself. — Bill Murray

I mean, sometimes ... a comedian becomes an actor, and they just don't deliver, because the bottom line of comedy is to be funny, and the bottom line of acting is to be truthful, and they get that mixed up sometimes, or don't even notice that that's the thing. — Eddie Izzard

Sometimes fake laughing is hard once you've done a scene 18 times. I don't want to brag, but I have a reputation for being very, very good at that. It's funny finding what's challenging about acting as you go. — Allison Williams

At once, it's clear I cannot gush. We try me playing cocky, but I just don't have the arrogance. Apparently, I'm too "vulnerable" for ferocity. I'm not witty. Funny. Sexy. Or mysterious By the end of the session, I am no one at all. — Suzanne Collins

There's probably no one who understands Method acting better academically than I do, or actually uses it more in his work. But it's funny - nobody really sees that. It's perception versus reality, I suppose. — Jack Nicholson

I be goofy, kinda funny. Acting stupid but they love me. — Mac Miller

It's so funny, you go to acting school thinking you're going to learn how to be other people, but really it taught me how to be myself. Because it's in understanding yourself deeply that you can lend yourself to another person's circumstances and another person's experience. — Lupita Nyong'o

The funny thing is that making a pilot is sort of an audition, at least for me. There's something psychological there, where you're sort of asking for the job while you're acting. And then when it's been picked up, it's a completely different psychological dynamic. — Justin Kirk

I love being a dad, it keeps me fit and inspired and children are so funny. They always supply you with acting material! — Wesley Snipes

When I'm not acting, I try to be normal, play golf, play hockey. It's funny because you're in this little bubble when you're working - you don't read books, you don't really keep up with the news, you're just living that life. — Taylor Kitsch

I'm surrounded by friends and family who are not that impressed by celebrity. They don't have any problem telling me I'm acting like an idiot or I'm not that funny. — Paloma Faith

It's funny, when you become an actor and you're successful, they don't want to talk about acting any more. 'Hey let's talk about that stuff you were fired from.' — Nicholas Brendon

It was a kind of one-upmanship, where nobody knows what's going on, and they'd put the other one down as if they did know. They all fake that they know, and if one student admits for a moment that something is confusing by asking a question, the others take a high-handed attitude, acting as if it's not confusing at all, telling him that he's wasting their time ... All the work they did, intelligent people, but they got themselves into this funny state of mind, this strange kind of self-propagating "education" which is meaningless, utterly meaningless. — Richard Feynman

It was the most fun I've ever had on a movie. It was one of the happiest times in my life. I was living in New York, and I really enjoyed acting at the time. Also, it's funny because that was also the time when I went downhill. — Mickey Rourke

Acting is all about big hair and funny props ... All the great actors knew it. Olivier knew it, Brando knew it. — Harold Ramis

I was never an actress in high school. I didn't start acting until I was in my twenties. I was just a funny cheerleader. I hadn't even seen a show until I was in my twenties, so I was very late getting into the business. — Debra Monk

I find what I do for a living really funny. I mean, acting is kind of a hilarious thing for a grown man to call a job. — Christian Bale

It's funny because I'm so used to acting in English that any time I have these moments where I have to speak Russian, it definitely takes a different part of my brain to pull it off, but it's always nice and fun. — Ksenia Solo

You just suddenly think that there's something quite childish about acting. Basically, it's pretending, isn't it? It's good fun and I enjoy it, but it's a funny way of making a living, particularly when you make a very good wage, as I've been fortunate enough to do. — Kevin Whately

It's kind of funny, with all of the different outlets that come from acting that you could try, I would love to direct and kind of be involved in art direction, too. — Imogen Poots

The number one rule of comedy acting is 'don't try to be funny.' Act as seriously as possible. — Daniel J. Goor

I don't mean to sound - I don't want it to come out funny, but I don't like show business. I love - I love acting in films. I love it. — Gene Wilder

It's funny how strangers can pass in front of you every day and all you see is a flat shadow, a vague outline, not noticing any of the details. They move in a gray crowd, always looking the same and acting the same, simple caricatures of who they really are, but once you get to know them, you notice the specific, tiniest things, you pay attention to the intricacies of their personalities, their habits and particular ways of walking and talking, the subtle changes in their appearance and dress. — Gregory Galloway

I used to like Barbra Streisand films. It was 'Funny Girl' that really turned me on, in a sense, to acting. I remember it specifically being a rainy Saturday afternoon. I couldn't play football, so I stayed in, and I watched 'Funny Girl.' — Sean Harris

Writing is the great skill, the creative skill. The acting is more an interpretative skill. And the thrill for me is the moment when I think of something. And then the challenge is how to get that funny idea to work in terms of the structure and that kind of thing, which is - and that's what I really love doing. — John Cleese

Do you think Meg cares for him?" asked Mrs. March, with an anxious look.
"Mercy me! I don't know anything about love and such nonsense!" cried Jo, with a funny mixture of interest and contempt. "In novels, the girls show it by starting and blushing, fainting away, growing thin, and acting like fools. Now Meg does not do anything of the sort. She eats and drinks and sleeps like a sensible creature. — Louisa May Alcott

Being funny has always mattered a lot to me. It's why I started acting - to make my friends laugh. — Nick Wechsler

Once an actor told me he went to the Shakespeare School of Acting, and I said, 'I went to the Shakespeare of Acting, too' and he said, 'Oh really?' And I said, 'I went to Shakespeare Elementary School in Chicago.' He didn't take the joke well, he didn't laugh and didn't think it was funny - I thought it was funny. It's all the same to me. — Michael Clarke Duncan

I'm really getting into acting and TV. 'Sports Illustrated' is a big, iconic brand I'd like to work for, too. But TV and acting is really funny and a bit more exciting than shooting all the time. — Charlotte McKinney

At this point, I've really failed at a lot of things. It's nice to be able to say that, in a way. I've failed at music. I've failed at dance. And acting - there have been times when I went out and read lines to audition for acting parts. I believe that if anybody wrangled together those audition tapes, it would be pretty hysterically funny. — Steve-O