Quotes & Sayings About Stage Fright

For me I have learned to enjoy everything, especially performing live, so much more. I used to get horrible stage fright when I was younger and today and just love to sing for anyone who still turns up at my shows! — Olivia Newton-John

Actually, I failed drama in high school because of nerves. I wasn't able to memorize the words. I had complete stage fright. — Constance Marie

I used to suffer from stage fright, which at times was an ordeal. I won't perform live again. I'm going to do some TV shows and videos but nothing else ... I don't like to travel too much or do concerts. I'm more of a studio and home girl. — Agnetha Faltskog

I have horrible stage fright - you know how you go through the bi-polar stage fright thing? Then you go on drugs to get over the stage fright and perform, but then you're not funny at all. — Roseanne Barr

I get stage fright with short stories. For me it feels like standup comedy: kill or die. I'm more confident when I begin a novel because I know I have space to fail. — Sefi Atta

I have big, big stage fright. — Andrea Bocelli

Of course it does on opening night, but I've never had that devastating stage fright that some people get, but apparently, you can develop it. — Joan Collins

Fame: an embalmer trembling with stage fright. — H.L. Mencken

I had serious performance stage fright. I kept my singing to the confines of my shower and car, while doing the dishes, and in my basement, but I would burst out crying if anyone asked me to sing. — Michelle Chamuel

The idea of doing theatre always terrified me because I get terrible stage fright. In the early 1970s I was offered a panto but the thought of going on stage was just too mortifying. — Britt Ekland

I get stage fright and gremlins in my head saying: 'You're going to forget your lines'. — Alan Rickman

I have stage fright every single concert I've ever done. I have at least four or five minutes of it. It's absolute living hell. — Brian Wilson

It's never fun to be scared [about stage fright] but I think that it is important and it's healthy to always push yourself. — Rose Leslie

I have had a very difficult time with stage fright; it undermines your well-being and peace of mind, and it can also threaten your livelihood. — Renee Fleming

When you get real stage fright, it comes like a sledgehammer out of the blue in the middle of something that you know you've done too many times before, and there's no rhyme or reason for it. It's something quite different from being nervous. It's almost paralysing. — Billie Whitelaw

Stage fright and acting blocks are just unfocused or misplaced energy. Everything is possible if you know how and where to focus to invite inspiration ... Inspiration is a sensation in the body. It can be invited upon your will and willingness to experience it taking you over.. — Marjo-Riikka Makela

I started out doing my mother's nightclub act, and I had stage fright. — Carrie Fisher

You get used to it, you look forward to the adrenaline of the stage fright before you go out. — Brian Henson

The absolute contingency of the encounter with someone I didn't know finally takes on the appearance of destiny. The declaration of love marks the transition from chance to destiny, and that's why it is so perilous and so burdened with a kind of horrifying stage fright. — Alain Badiou

Many people associate stage fright with a fear of looking ridiculous, making a bad impression. For me, it's like a kind of fever. — Jeanne Moreau

I've never told anyone this. But I suffer from terrible stage fright. True. You can't tell though, can you? Unbelievable, the panic. I nearly die of fear before I go on stage. Something wicked. I can't eat a thing the day before a gig. It'd make me vomit. — John Lydon

There has been in our time a lack of reliance on language and a lack of experimentation which are frightening to anyone who sees them as symptoms. We know the phenomenon of stage-fright: it holds the player shivering, incapable of speech or action. Perhaps there is an audience-fright which the play can feel, which leaves him with these incapacities. — Muriel Rukeyser

If you have stage fright, it never goes away. But then I wonder: is the key to that magical performance because of the fear? — Stevie Nicks

God bless Dad, he came to every one of my shows. I was bad, and I had horrible stage fright. My dad was so relieved - he'd say, 'You were terrible; this kid is not going to be an actor.' Finally, I did a play and he said, 'Son - you were really good.' — Kirk Douglas

When you're sick on the road, it's the worst. That's when you become the most vulnerable and neurotic. You become scared. If I had a cold or a chest infection, and I had to sing all those high parts, there was stage fright. — Richie Sambora

Stage fright is not a thing about 'Am I any good?' It's about 'Am I gonna be good tonight?' It's a right-now thing. It helps me. If I went out there thinkin', 'Eh, we'll go slaughter 'em,' I'm positive something would go seriously wrong. — Gregg Allman

But for every adult person you look up to in life there is trailing behind them an invisible chain gang of ghosts, all of which, as a child, you are generously spared from meeting. I know now, however, that these ghosts exist, and that other adults can see them. The lost loves, the hurt friends, the dead: they follow their owner forever. Perhaps this is why we feel so crowded around those people who we know have had hard times. Perhaps this is why we find so little to say. We suffer an odd brand of stage fright, I think, before all those dreadful eyes. — M O Walsh

When I was 6 I became the poster child for my hospital and would go to banquets and make speeches. I did not get stage fright and I actually enjoyed talking to people of all ages. — Atticus Shaffer

The first lecture of each new year renews for most people a light stage fright. — John Edensor Littlewood

Touch me again, Bird Man, I thought urgently. Tell a joke, say anything -- because I was having the convection feeling. As if my skin were rippling, dissolving. Kiwi describes this phenomenon, "convection" {n}, in his Field Notes: the rapid cooling of a body in the absence of all tourists. Even Kiwi, King of Stage Fright, admitted to feeling it on Sunday nights. Convection caused your thoughts to develop an alarming blue tinge and required touch or speech with another human being as its antidote (Seths didn't work, not even my red Seth, I'd tried). Sweating could feel dangerous if you were alone in the swamp, as if droplet by droplet your body might get whisked into the sun. — Karen Russell

Every audience has its character; I like America - they love me. I suffer from stage fright, but in America not so much. — Andrea Bocelli

My stage fright gets worse at every performance. During the overture I hope for a theater fire, typhoon, revolution in the Pentagon. — Hildegard Knef

But I have fun with the fright, work with it. You have to - that's your timing, that beat of excitement. And when I go on stage, it's just like taking a step into heaven. Poof, you know? Poof - and there I am. — Eddie Bracken

I'm always aware of being observed. Always self-conscious. I'm evidently living my life with stage fright. — Donna Cooner

He has seen his birth and death many times, he says, and pays random visits to all the events in between.
He says.
Billy is spastic in time, has no control over where he is going next, and the trips aren't necessarily fun. He is in a constant state of stage fright, he says, because he never knows what part of his life he is going to act in next. — Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

The truth is, I hate to perform. I get such bad stage fright, it makes me physically ill. — Rivers Cuomo

In my career, I've had kind of a strange trajectory as an actor. I started out doing movies and theater and stuff, but then I had a terrible problem with stage fright as an actor on stage, and I quit stage acting for a long, long time. — Fred Melamed

People talk about stage fright, but what scares me is not so much the going on as the going off. I only come to life when people are watching. - Red Skelton — Douglas Wissing

I had - after I sang the 'Star Spangled Banner' so badly, after my tragic singing accident, after that, you know, all my stuff kind of, like, really got even more full blown and, you know, I got stage fright and, you know, I couldn't do stand-up anymore and let alone sing and all the other things. — Roseanne Barr

Stand-up is not something that you're good at right away. You have to do it a ton. But, I think I got to shave a year off because I didn't have to get over stage fright. — Amy Schumer

I guess you could say I'm an addict - an adrenalin addict - I get great excitement and stimulation from doing stuff in public, even though I'm nervous and I have very bad stage fright. — Barry Humphries

He is in a constant state of stage fright, he says, because he never knows what part of his life he is going to have to act in next — Kurt Vonnegut

People say to me, you have not got stage fright. And if I haven't got stage fright, then I'm going to be comfortable within myself, and then something - I've always been that way and so I'm fighting to get away from that fear. — Ozzy Osbourne

I've never suffered stage fright. That fascinates people. — Ethel Merman

A little bit of stage fright, then I'm ready. — Faith Hill

Stage fright, like epilepsy, is a divine ailment, a sacred madness ... It is a grace that is sufficient in the old Jesuit sense - that is, insufficient by itself but a necessary condition for success. — Charles Rosen

I still suffer terribly from stage fright. I get sick with fear. Not every night, but at the beginning and on occasion - not necessarily when I'm expecting it. You just have to cope with it - take it on the chin and work through it, trying to use the adrenalin to perform. — Helen Mirren

Anytime you have to get intimate on camera, it's always a little interesting. You have to trick your brain almost, so that you don't get stage fright or get too much in your head where you're super uncomfortable. — Evan Rachel Wood

I love readings and my readers, but the din of voices of the audience gives me stage fright, and the din of voices inside whisper that I am a fraud, and that the jig is up. Surely someone will rise up from the audience and say out loud that not only am I not funny and helpful, but I'm annoying, and a phony. — Anne Lamott

Oddly enough, I have really bad stage fright - getting up in front of people. And I made a living going on live television. — Bill Hader

In my opinion, the only way to conquer stage fright is to get up on stage and play. Every time you play another show, it gets better and better. — Taylor Swift

One of the nice things about moving from acting to writing is that your work can be in the public eye without having to be in the public eye yourself. I guess that's not completely true. If you're lucky - and I have been - there are book tours and lectures. I don't have stage fright, and I enjoy meeting people, so that's easy and enjoyable, but it's not a constant, and it's not celebrity. — Debra Dean

Nor are introverts necessarily shy. Shyness is the fear of social disapproval or humiliation, while introversion is a preference for environments that are not overstimulating. Shyness is inherently painful; introversion is not. One reason that people confuse the two concepts is that they sometimes overlap (though psychologists debate to what degree). Some psychologists map the two tendencies on vertical and horizontal axes, with the introvert-extrovert spectrum on the horizontal axis, and the anxious-stable spectrum on the vertical. With this model, you end up with four quadrants of personality types: calm extroverts, anxious (or impulsive) extroverts, calm introverts, and anxious introverts. In other words, you can be a shy extrovert, like Barbra Streisand, who has a larger-than-life personality and paralyzing stage fright; or a non-shy introvert, like Bill Gates, who by all accounts keeps to himself but is unfazed by the opinions of others. — Susan Cain

I'm suffering from stage fright. I don't like making speeches. I'm the kind of introvert actor who likes putting on other people's clothes and pretending to be somebody else, which is completely crazy choice of profession. So, I don't enjoy public speaking and I have every sympathy for anyone who has to do it and doesn't enjoy it. — Helena Bonham Carter

I like to take a puff or two before going on the air. I still get stage fright when I have to perform. A little grass gets rid of the problem. — Bob Denver

I'm just living each day, and I'm better equipped to do so. I mean, I used to be totally afraid, I used to have, like, permanent stage fright. But now I'm trying to have fun. I'm trying to bring as much happiness to as many people as possible. — Rivers Cuomo

If you don't have a certain amount of stage fright, then it's not going to be that interesting. It's not going to have the inner vibration. I think screen work needs inner vibration. — Charlotte Rampling

To begin with, I don't have any stage fright. — Ednita Nazario

['Fire and Rain'] is sort of almost uncomfortably close. Almost confessional. The reason I could write a song like that at that point, and probably couldn't now, is that I didn't have any sense that anyone would hear it. I started writing the song while I was in London ... and I was totally unknown ... So I assumed that they would never be heard. I could just write or say anything I wanted. Now I'm very aware, and I have to deal with my stage fright and my anxiety about people examining or judging it. The idea that people will pass judgment on it is not a useful thought. — James Taylor

Stage fright is my worst problem. A voice is very intimate. It's something of your own. So there's always this fear, because you feel naked. There's a fear of not reaching up to expectations. — Andrea Bocelli

Throughout my career, nervousness and stage-fright have never left me before playing. And each of the thousands of concerts I have played at, I feel as bad as I did the very first time. — Pablo Casals

You always get nervous on stage because when you get up there, you want to do great. The crowd has you pumped up so there are always a little bit of butterflies. That's all part of it. But as far as getting stage fright, clamming up there, not generally, I just enjoy it on stage and have a great time. — Easton Corbin

I would have stage-fright if I had to speak with every one of the people before whom I speak. — Karl Kraus

As for the stage fright, it never goes away. When I'm waiting in the wings to go on, it's agony every single time but I stay focused and I know that once I'm on stage it'll be fine; I'll be in my happy little bubble. — Britt Ekland

It's interesting - years ago, I had such bad stage fright during musical theater auditions that I just gave up. And now I'm on Broadway. — Tom Lenk

I don't get stage fright, I actually love the energy, I love the spontaneity, I love the adrenaline you get in front of a live audience, it actually really works for me. — Brooke Burke

I have never known stage-fright at any time. — Kate Smith

And from the first moment that I ever walked on stage in front of a darkened auditorium with a couple of hundred people sitting there, I was never afraid, I was never fearful, I didn't suffer from stage fright, because I felt so safe on that stage. I wasn't Patrick Stewart, I wasn't in the environment that frightened me, I was pretending to be someone else, and I liked the other people I pretended to be. So I felt nothing but security for being on stage. And I think that's what drew me to this strange job of playing make-believe. — Patrick Stewart

Once, and only once, I walked on stage and my mind went utterly blank! I had no idea why I was there! My fellow actors had to rescue me. I was very young and new to the business, so I'm glad it didn't give me stage fright for the rest of my life! — Laura Donnelly

I don't get stage fright. I do get nervous before I play in front of big audiences [though]. — Jack Barakat

I didn't have traditional stage fright. If there was 500 people in the audience or three people in the audience, it didn't really make a difference. What made a difference was the conductor. Everything that I was scared about as a drummer was him. — Damien Chazelle

Alan: "I had terrible stage fright."
Sin: "I'm not familiar with the concept of 'stage fright.'"
A: "It's pretty awful. You end up having to picture the entire audience in their underwear. Phyllis was in that audience, you know."
S: "Why, Alan, I had no idea your tastes ran that way."
A: "Phyllis is a very nice lady. And I do not consider her so much aged as matured, like a fine wine. But I still think you owe me an archery lesson. — Sarah Rees Brennan

I feel it's all wrong to be nervous," said Maria. "I feel it's lack of confidence. One ought to go right ahead, never minding."
"Some people do," he said, "but they're the duds. They are the ones that win prizes at school, and you never hear of them again. Go on. Be nervous. Be ill. Be sick down the lavatory pan. It's part of your life from now on. You've got to go through with it. Nothing's worth while if you don't fight for it first, if you haven't a pain in your belly beforehand. — Daphne Du Maurier

I conquered my stage fright a long time ago. In my line of work, it's kind of a pre-requisite that you not feel bad about looking stupid in front of a lot of people. — Buzz Osborne

People ask me if I have stage fright. I say, "God, no, I'm completely comfortable there. I have rest-of-the-day fright." — Adam Duritz

I've never really been one to get what they call stage fright so much. — Sean Penn

I have been nervous before, but I have never had stage fright. — Gloria Gaynor

Stage fright is my worst problem. — Andrea Bocelli

I originally started it to help me with anxiety & insomnia. It's already made my life waaaaaaaaaaaaaay better & even with my stage fright. Which I used to think there was no cure for ... Last night was the first night I've slept 8 hours naturally in my entire life. I felt the best I have in ages. It's better than any medication or all of the other nonsense I've tried. — Sky Ferreira

There was a while when I got really bad stage fright and I basically felt ... I was incredibly angry. I felt like everything had been taken away from me and it was at that point that I realized how much doing stand up reminds me of my self love and curiosity about myself and love of other people because I don't go on stage to dominate. — Jenny Slate

I suffer greatly from nerves. I have stage-fright badly, and it gets worse, but the stage is still my life. — Barry Humphries

I can't remember that I ever had just a minute of stage fright. — Henry Rollins

Several performers have told me that they do the following brief lovingkindness meditation if they have stage fright: Standing in front of an audience, before they start acting, playing music, or reciting a poem, they send out wishes for the well-being of everyone in the room. 'When I do that,' one singer told me, 'I no longer have a sense of the audience as a group of hostile people out there waiting to judge me. I feel, okay, here we all are together. — Sharon Salzberg

I suffer a lot with nerves and stage fright. — Sheridan Smith

I definitely suffered from stage fright. I had to work really hard to come out of my shell. When I was little, I was very loud and loved performing in front of people. I was fearless. When I hit puberty, I became very shy and self-conscious. — Brianna Brown

Clear your throat and open your eyes. You are on stage. The lights are on. It's only natural if you're sweating, because this isn't make-believe. This is theater for keeps. Yes, it is a massive stage, and there are millions of others on stage with you. Yes, you can try to shake the fright by blending in. But it won't work. You have the Creator God's full attention, as much attention as He ever gave Napoleon. Or Churchill. Or even Moses. Or billions of others who lived and died unknown. Or a grain of sand. Or one spike on one snowflake. You are spoken. You are seen. It is your turn to participate in creation. Like a kindergartener shoved out from behind the curtain during his first play, you might not know which scene you are in or what comes next, but God is far less patronizing than we are. You are His art, and He has no trouble stooping. You can even ask Him for your lines. — N.D. Wilson

I am basically the sort of person who has stage-fright teaching. I kind of creep into a classroom. I'm not an anecdote-teller, either, although I often wish I were. — Lydia Davis

I always feel like if someone has stage fright, I really try and say, "Listen, these people want you to succeed, they want to have a good evening. They want to see something really great. They don't want to see something crappy. They don't. They want to be at something really special." — Laurie Anderson

Sports just happen to be excellent for avoiding foreign-language stage fright and developing lasting friendships while still sounding like Tarzan. — Timothy Ferriss

Yeah ... I was a singer as a kid. I had a lot of stage fright, and what's happened with 'Idol,' it has got me past so much of that. — Kara DioGuardi

The Alexander Technique has helped me to undo knots, unblock energy and deal with almost paralysing stage fright — William Hurt

And my wrist froze STAGE FRIGHT — Nicki Minaj

(...) Stage fright, if you like. Easier to hide behind a persona than to bare one's soul. I'm really not the monster you think I am. I just wanted to talk to you unencumbered by all this complications, all this ... history. [Jakab] — Stephen Lloyd Jones

Yes, I was scared, it was like stage fright, but I worked through it. If you've gotten to the door, you shouldn't doubt you can open it. — Lara Fabian