Best Ramis Quotes & Sayings

My job is to come up with something that you like and you agree with that you would play wholeheartedly. If we disagree, I may not be doing my job correctly. — Harold Ramis

You just make sure you don't screw it up. It's going to work as long as you don't mess it up. Hopefully you have plenty of those moments in a big comedy. — Harold Ramis

The trick with sequels is, you have to give people what they liked before, yet be innovative enough so they don't feel like they're seeing the same movie. — Harold Ramis

It's a great luxury for me to be able to write on the films that I direct, and kind of a nice thing to be able to write enough to get credit, which is difficult for a director. — Harold Ramis

I used to be married to a woman who pursued every spiritual trend with tremendous passion and dragged me along. I don't believe in anything. I'd seen mediums and readers. — Harold Ramis

I've never taken a script to the stage or to principal photography and said, "This is perfect. This is as good as it can possibly be." It's not Shakespeare, you know; you know it can probably be better. — Harold Ramis

I'm a writer-director-actor, which I've always kind of enjoyed. I compared it to the Olympic biathlon. "Not only can he cross-country ski, but he's a terrific marksman as well." I want people to say, "You mean that writer performed a tracheotomy?" That's right, I do everything. — Harold Ramis

I made a handshake agreement with my best friend in college, Michael Shamberg, who is now a movie producer. We used to write shows together, and we said, "Let's only do what's fun. Let's never take a job where we have to dress up in a suit." — Harold Ramis

At a certain point, you have to convince the actors that you've done the right thing. The way I work, if I can't convince them, I've got to move on. I can't coerce them or browbeat them. — Harold Ramis

I've been directing for 25 years almost, and I've only directed nine films in that time because I like to be careful. — Harold Ramis

We were tremendously encouraged by the testing of Analyze That. Audiences loved it. They were telling us that they liked it as much as the original. We recorded the laughs in the theater. — Harold Ramis

Parents tell us things to protect us, or they educate us from their own misinformation or misconceptions. — Harold Ramis

I was the little guy who knew how to tie a necktie. It came from having absentee parents. They were tremendously loving and caring people who, by circumstance, had to go to work. — Harold Ramis

I look for the meaning in what's funny, and I look for what's funny about things that are meaningful to me. — Harold Ramis

Stand-up is every man for himself; you learn from hanging out at these clubs and watching other guys, and then trying not to be like them. — Harold Ramis

No one will laugh at how great things are for somebody. — Harold Ramis

It's like the old rule-if you introduce a gun into the first act of a play, it's going to be used in the third act. So if you do a movie about criminals, you have to accept there's going to be Some action. — Harold Ramis

Most comedy is not very ambitious. You probably can't name more than a handful of comedies that would qualify for Best Picture. — Harold Ramis

When someone's an actor and you're an actor, you meet them and you feel like you know them. We're in the same business, and we all speak the same comedy language. — Harold Ramis

Chicago still remains a Mecca of the Midwest - people from both coasts are kind of amazed how good life is in Chicago, and what a good culture we've got. You can have a pretty wonderful artistic life and never leave Chicago. — Harold Ramis

The rule of thumb for a director or producer - which prevents them from just sticking their names on everything - is that you have to contribute substantially more than 50 percent of the character dialogue and story. — Harold Ramis

Comedy is essentially made by young men, or older men with some form of arrested development, for young men or immature older men. — Harold Ramis

If people work together, if they can keep a cooperative spirit and use their ingenuity and balance it all with good humor and good will, then there's nothing to be afraid of. That's the sappy part of it, ... On the other hand, every Halloween for many years when my kids were trick-or-treating I would put on my 'Ghostbusters' jumpsuit with a police flashlight to protect all the kids from ghosts. — Harold Ramis

I collect spores, molds, and fungus — Harold Ramis

That's one of the great things about DVD: In addition to reaching people who didn't catch the movie in theaters, you get to have this interaction of sorts. — Harold Ramis

Where's the great pay? Where's the travel? Where's the Winnebago, Goddamnit! — Harold Ramis

The times change, and to the extent that comedy captures the spirit of the times, it will enjoy success. — Harold Ramis

When a director writes, there's a compulsory arbitration. You have a right to challenge any of the arbitrators, but they pick three of four arbitrators who read all the drafts with no names attached and then allocate credit. — Harold Ramis

Films are big hits when they touch a lot of people. Things are not funny in a vacuum, they're funny because we respond to some personal dislocation, some embarrassment, some humiliation, some pain we've suffered, or some desire we have. — Harold Ramis

As an actor, you're completely at the mercy of other people. You basically go begging for the opportunity to work. As a writer, at least nobody can tell me what to do. I can write what I want. I might not sell it, but at least I'm in control. — Harold Ramis

I loved writing and performing, but the idea of doing it for a living seemed so remote. But I eventually let it devolve to the point where it was the only thing I could do. — Harold Ramis

The comic impulse is sometimes a reaction to sadness. You feel like you can make one choice or the other. — Harold Ramis

I never read Playboy before I started working there and stopped reading it the day I quit. — Harold Ramis

You can't not have feelings about country clubs, whichever side you're on. — Harold Ramis