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Mirabelle Replaces The Absent Friends With Books And Television Mysteries Of The Pbs Kind. The Books Are Mostly Nineteenth-century Novels In Which Women Are Poisoned Or Are Doing The Poisoning. She Does Not Read These Books As A Romantic Lonely Hearts Turning Pages In The Isolation Of Her Room, Not At All. She Is Instead An Educated Spirit With A Sense Of Irony. She Loves The Gloom Of These Period Novels, Especially As Kitsch, But Beneath It All She Finds That A Part Of Her Indentifies With All That Darkness.

-Steve Martin

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Mirabelle Replaces The Absent

Steve Martin

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Mirabelle Replaces The Absent Friends With Books And Television Mysteries Of The Pbs Kind. The Books Are Mostly Nineteenth-century Novels In Which Women Are Poisoned Or Are Doing The Poisoning. She Does Not Read These Books As A Romantic Lonely Hearts Turning Pages In The Isolation Of Her Room, Not At All. She Is Instead An Educated Spirit With A Sense Of Irony. She Loves The Gloom Of These Period Novels, Especially As Kitsch, But Beneath It All She Finds That A Part Of Her Indentifies With All That Darkness.

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I Will Do Anything To Look Like Him - Except, Of Course, Exercise Or Eat Right.

I Just Downloaded Eleven Hundred Books Onto My Kindle, And Now I Can’t Lift It.

The Course Was More Plodding Than Heroic: I Did Not Strive Valiantly Against Doubters But Took Incremental Steps Studded With A Few Intuitive Leaps.

I'm The Leader Of The Platoon And I Run Gambling And Lotteries, Dances And I Sell Beer Illegally. I'm A Con Man And I'm Thoroughly Lovable.

His View Of The World Is One That Keeps His Blood Pressure Low, Sweeping The Cholesterol From His Relaxed, Freeway-sized Arteries. Everyone Knows He Is Going To Live Till Age Ninety, Although The Question That Goes Begging Is, “for What?

I Think I Did Pretty Well, Considering I Started Out With Nothing But A Bunch Of Blank Paper.

She Had Destroyed Whatever Was Between Us By Making A Profound Gaffe: She Met Me.

No Matter How Many Times People Say It - 'oh, I'm Just Writing This For Myself' 'oh, I'm Just Doing This For Myself' - Nobody's Doing It For Themselves! You're Doing It For An Audience. So Whether I'm Performing Or Writing A Book Or Playing Music, It's Definitely To Be Put Out There And To Be Received In Some Way, Definitely.

In Talking To Girls I Could Never Remember The Right Sequence Of Things To Say. I'd Meet A Girl And Say, Hi, Was It Good For You Too? If A Girl Spent The Night, I'd Wake Up In The Morning And Then Try To Get Her Drunk.

Only Then Does He Realize What He Has Done To Mirabelle, How Wanting A Square Inch Of Her And Not All Of Her Has Damaged Them Both, And How He Cannot Justify His Actions Except That, Well, It Was Life.

I Used To Think A Wedding Was A Simple Affair. Boy And Girl Meet, They Fall In Love, He Buys A Ring, She Buys A Dress, They Say I Do. I Was Wrong. That's Getting Married. A Wedding Is An Entirely Different Proposition.

Falling In Love

I Never Had A Movie That I Wanted To Do Turned Down In My Whole Life. I Always Write The Script First So It Speaks For Itself.

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.

I Don't Watch Myself Generally. I Do Something, See It Once, And Then I'll Probably Never See It Again Unless It's An Accident.

A Remarkable Memoir That's Packed With Anecdotes, Advice And Humor, All While Maintaining A High Level Of Dignity And Self-awareness.

I Was Very Vulnerable To Criticism For Many Years. I Could Read A Bad Review And Remember It My Whole Life.

With Comedy, You Never Know Until You Put It In Front Of An Audience. You Shoot It And A Year Later You Have No Idea If It's Going To Work. And Then You Get The Response. It's Great When It's Good.

It's Spooky To Look At Yourself, Because You Are Never Quite What You Think You Are. And You Are Never As Good Looking As The Person You Are Acting With, Or Something Like That. So I Learned To Stay Away From It Because It Was Giving Me More Negative Feelings Than Positive Ones.

I've Always Believed That There Are Funny People Everywhere, But They're Just Not Comedians. In Fact, Some Of My Best Comedic Inspirations Were Not Professional Entertainers.

I Handed In A Script Last Year And The Studio Didn't Change One Word. The Word They Didn't Change Was On Page 87.

The Bluegrass Community... Can Be Very Strict. I Didn't Know If I'd Be Welcomed Into The Bluegrass Community Or Not, But I Think They Judge You Very Fairly... I Felt Really Welcome.

There Is Something Going On Now In Mexico That I Happen To Think Is Cruelty To Animals. What I'm Talking About, Of Course, Is Cat Juggling.

Relationships End, But They Don't End Your Life. But People Do Often Spending More Time Finding Out About Failed Relationships Than Finding Successful Ones.

Bad Relationship

The Thing About The Banjo Is When You First Hear It, It Strikes Many People As What's That? There's Something Very Compelling About It To Certain People.

A Day With Out Sun Shine Is Like..........night

I Knew I Wanted To Be In Show Business So I Took The Path Of Least Resistance. I Loved Comedy. But You Never Know You Are Funny Until People Laugh. It's Just What I Was Interested In. I Could Make People Laugh, I Guess, But Doing It At School And Doing It Onstage Are Very Different Things.

I Just Wanted To Be In Show Business. I Didn't Care If I Was Going To Be An Actor Or A Magician Or What. Comedy Was A Point Of The Least Resistance, Really. And On The Simplest Level, I Loved Comedy.

I'm Always Looking For Something To Engage My Imagination And Take Me On A Little Mental Voyage. I Just Want A New Topic In My Life.

Dinosaurs Did Not Walk With Humans. The Evolutionary Record Says Different. They Gambled.

College Totally Changed My Life. It Changed What I Believe And What I Think About Everything. I Majored In Philosophy.

Unlike Ray Porter, His Love Is Fearless And Without Reservation.

Nothing I Do Is Done By Popular Demand.

I Think I Meant That, Given The Circumstances Of My Childhood, I Had The Illusion That It's Easier To Be Alone. To Have Your Relationships Be Casual And Also To Pose As A Solitary Person, Because It Was More Romantic. You Know, I Was Raised On The Idea Of The Ramblin' Man And The Loner.

I Thought Yesterday Was The First Day Of The Rest Of My Life But It Turns Out Today Is.

You Know What Your Problem Is, It's That You Haven't Seen Enough Movies - All Of Life's Riddles Are Answered In The Movies.

You Know That Look That Women Get When They Want To Have Sex? Me Neither.

I've Decided To Take Up Smoking, My Doctor Said I Wasn't Getting Enough Tar.

Writing Is Something I Took Up Rather Than Anything I Had An Inclination Toward. I Like Acting -delivering Someone Else's Message - But Writing Is More Of An Accomplishment.

There's A Lot Of Thought In Art. People Get To Talk About Important Things. There's A Lot Of Sex, You Know, In Art. There's A Lot Of Naked Women And Men, And There's Intrigue, There's Fakery. It's A Real Microcosm Of The Larger World.

I Think Films Are About Having A Good Time, So I Don't Know That There's A Message. The Message Of A Film Is Always What A Critic Writes, And The Fun Of A Film Or The Emotion Of A Film Is What The Audience Feels.

I Guess I Wouldn't Believe In Anything If It Weren't For My Lucky Astrology Mood Watch.

All Of Life’s Riddles Are Answered In The Movies.

With Comedy, You Have No Place To Go But More Comedy, So You're Never Off The Hook.

What Is A Movie Star? A Movie Star Is Many Things. They Can Be Tall, Short, Thin, Or Skinny. They Can Be Democrats... Or Skinny.

I Would Say The Three Stages Of Making A Film Are The Initial 'are We Gonna Do This,' 'how Much Will I Be Paid,' Is There A Lot Of Nights, Who's It Going To Be With? The Second Stage Of Doing A Film Is How Much Fun Your Going To Have Doing It. The Third Stage Is Was The Film A Hit?

The Banjo Is Truly An American Instrument, And It Captures Something About Our Past.

I Thought If I Had A Twitter Feed And Say I Had A Following Of A 100,000, That Means 100,000 Of Them Would Be Interested In My Book. It Was Logical, But It Didn't Turn Out To Be True. It Turned Out If I Had A Twitter Feed Of A 100,000, Four Of Them Were Interested In My Book.

A Girl Who Is Willing To Give Every Ounce Of Herself To Someone, Who Could Never Betray Her Lover, Who Never Suspects Maliciousness Of Anyone, And Whose Sexuality Sleeps In Her, Waiting To Be Stirred.

I'm Tired Of Wasting Letters When Punctuation Will Do, Period.

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."

No Art Comes From The Conscious Mind.

The Operation Was A Success, But I'm Afraid The Doctor Is Dead.

When Someone Less Capable Is Ahead Of Me, I Am Not Pleased. It Makes Me Insane.

I Just Gave My Cat A Bath. Now How Do I Get All This Fur Off My Tounge?

Introductions Are Hard To Come By When Your Natural State Is Shyness

We've Taken What Was Just Once A Racetrack And Made It A Multifaceted Gaming Destination For The Entire Region.

'dirty Rotten Scoundrels' Is A Good One Because It Not Only Turned Out, I Think, To Be A Really Funny Movie But It Was Also A Delight To Shoot. We Were In The South Of France, Working With Glenne Headly And Michael Caine And Frank Oz The Director - Who Were Just Fun.

It Is The Perfect Wrong Time For Jeremy To Do To Mirabelle What She Had Done To Him - Call Him Up For A Quick Fix - Because;, In A Sense, She Is Now Betrothed. Her First Date With Someone Who Treated Her Well Obligates Her To Faithfulness, At Least Until The Relationship Is Explored.

. . . Now You See . . . They' Re Not Fit For Humans . . ." "put Them On Me.

When You're Touring And If You Go To A Party, There's Automatically A Celebrity-audience Distance. It Follows You Around, Especially When You're On The Road In Small Towns. Any Time There Is Awe, It Gets Very Difficult To Be Normal, To Be Yourself. But I'm Not Saying That That's What Made Me The Way I Am. I've Probably Always Been Distant.

An Apology? Bah! Disgusting! Cowardly! Beneath The Dignity Of Any Gentleman, However Wrong He Might Be.

She Has Learned That Her Body Is Precious And It Mustn't Be Offered Carelessly Ever Again, As It Holds A Direct Connection To Her Heart.

I Was Always Very Shy But As I Get Older I Think, What Am I Being Shy For? You Just Grow Weary Of Your Own Hang-ups.

Lord Loves A Workin' Man; Don't Trust Whitey

Boy, Those French: They Have A Different Word For Everything!

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I've Heard Lots Of People Lie To Themselves But They Never Fool Anyone.

I Had Loved Magic Tricks From The Time I Was Six Or Seven. I Bought Books On Magic. I Did Magic Acts For My Parents And Their Friends. I Was Aiming For Show Business From Early Days, And Magic Was The Poor Man's Way Of Getting In: You Buy A Trick For $2, And You've Got An Act.

Some People Have A Way With Words, And Other People...oh, Uh, Not Have Way.

I Studied With The Maharishi For Many Years, And Really Didn't Learn That Much. But One Thing That He Taught Me, I'll Never Forget: 'always...' No, Wait-- 'never...' No, Wait, It Was 'always Carry A Litter Bag In Your Car. It Doesn't Take Up Much Room, And If It Gets Full, You Can Toss It Out The Window.'

The Conscious Mind Is The Editor, And The Subconscious Mind Is The Writer.

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Movies Always Are Open To Being Remade Because Times Change So Much, And The Tempo Of Movies Changes. I Think Of It Like A James Bond. They Can Have Different Actors Play The Same Role... I've Had People Come Up To Me And Say, 'we Want To Remake 'the Jerk' With So And So.' And I Say, 'fine.' It Just Doesn't Bother Me. It's An Honor Actually.

It's Horrible For Someone To Listen To Someone Learning Any Instrument - When I Was First Learning The Banjo, I Used To Have To Go Out And Sit In The Car, And Even In The Summertime I'd Have To Roll Up The Windows. Because You Just Couldn't Practice A Banjo Or A Fiddle With Other People Around. Unless They're Being Paid.

Acting Keeps Me Alert To People, And Life. I Don't Know, There's Something About Going To Work Early In The Morning, And Having To Stay Alert And Concentrated. Maybe That Keeps Your Mind Alive.

There's No Better Way To Learn Something Than To Learn It In Front Of An Audience. Your Terror Drives You.

Throughout My Whole Life, As A Performer, I've Never Played With A Band. I've Always Played Alone, So I Was Never Required To Stay In Rhythm Or Anything. So It Was A Real Different Experience For Me To Start Playing With A Band. There Were So Many Basic Things For Me To Learn.

Different Experiences

I'm Enamored With The Art World. Anytime You Look At Anything That's Considered Artistic, There's A Commercial World Around It: The Ballet, Opera, Any Kind Of Music. It Can't Exist Without It.

Chaos In The Midst Of Chaos Isn't Funny, But Chaos In The Midst Of Order Is.

I Was Not Naturally Talented. I Didn't Sing, Dance Or Act, Though Working Around That Minor Detail Made Me Inventive.

I Would Like A Wine. The Purpose Of The Wine Is To Get Me Drunk. A Bad Wine Will Get Me As Drunk As A Good Wine. I Would Like The Good Wine. And Since The Result Is The Same No Matter Which Wine I Drink, I'd Like To Pay The Bad Wine Price.

I Loved Doing 'pennies From Heaven.' Because You Have To Understand That I'd Been Doing Comedy For 15 To 20 Years, And Suddenly Along Came The Opportunity To Do This Beautiful Film. It Was So Emotional To Me. I Loved It. I Don't Think It Was A Good Career Move, But I Have No Regrets About Doing It.

In My Banjo Show With The Steep Canyon Rangers, I Do Do Comedy During That Show. It'd Be Absurd Just To Stand There Mute And Play 25 Banjo Songs.

There Is One Thing I Would Break Up Over, And That Is If She Caught Me With Another Woman. I Won't Stand For That.

Always...no Wait...never.

When I Die, Now Don't Think That I'm A Nut, Don't Want No Fancy Funeral, Just One Like Old King Tut.

I Was Deeply Unhappy, But I Didn't Know It Because I Was So Happy All The Time.

I Love Money. I Love Everything About It. I Bought Some Pretty Good Stuff. Got Me A $300 Pair Of Socks. Got A Fur Sink. An Electric Dog Polisher. A Gasoline Powered Turtleneck Sweater. And, Of Course, I Bought Some Dumb Stuff, Too.

Hollywood Must Be The Only Place On Earth Where You Can Be Fired By A Man Wearing A Hawaiian Shirt And A Baseball Cap.

I Ignored My Stand-up Career For Twenty-five Years, But Now, Having Finished This Memoir, I View This Time With Surprising Warmth. One Can Have, It Turns Out, An Affection For The War Years.

When I First Started Doing My Stand-up Act, I Played The Banjo, Did Comedy, Magic Tricks, Juggled, Read Poetry. I Stuck It All In. I Didn't Know You Were Supposed To Just Stand Up And Tell Jokes. Essentially, That's What My Act Became: Those Five Elements - Except I Dropped The Poetry.

First The Doctor Told Me The Good News: I Was Going To Have A Disease Named After Me.

To Have Someone Play Off And Be With A Band Is More Pleasurable.

I Believe That Sex Is One Of The Most Beautiful, Natural, Wholesome Things That Money Can Buy.

I'm Not Vegas. Places I Play Usually Cost Like $3 To Get In, You Know, And People Are Going: Gee, I've Got $3, I Think I'll Throw It Away.

I Think There Are People Out There Writing Original Bluegrass Songs, But It's Hard To Get Them Out On The Air.

I Saw The Movie, 'crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon' And Was Surprised Because I Didn't See Any Tigers Or Dragons. And Then I Realized Why: They're Crouching And Hidden.

Whether I'm Involved In Creating Something Or Not, It's A Personal Issue Of Do I Respect It. But You Can Only Know That Five Or Ten Years Later.

Relationships End, But They Don't End Your Life.

Bad Relationship

Relationships Ending

Failed Relationship

I'm Trying To Think Of Other Ones. Oh, Yeah, I'd Say - Somebody Would Buy Something And We'd Say, And Because You Are Our Hundredth Customer Today, You Get A Free Paperback.

You Know, A Lot Of People Come To Me And They Say, "steve, How Can You Be So Fucking Funny?" There's A Secret To It, It's No Big Deal. Before I Go Out, I Put A Slice Of Bologna In Each Of My Shoes. So When I'm On Stage, I Feel Funny.

The Presence Of Excessive Wealth Puts An Unnatural Spin On The Appreciation Of Art.

I'm Not A Human Being. I'm Despicable And Disgusting - But That's Where The Money Is.

I Really Enjoy The Social Aspects Of Music As Much As Anything.

I Cringe At Backstory. Because It Never Quite Explains Or Gets Into Some Psychological Thing That Is Never Quite Right And Never Quite The Truth And Who Knows Why Someone Is Someway.

Women Have Choices, And Men Have Responsibilities.

I've Put An Umbrella In My Mouth And Opened It. I Sat In A Lemon-meringue Pie. I've Done Terrible Things To My Dog With A Fork.

You Know When You're Telling These Little Stories? Here's A Good Idea: Have A Point. It Makes It So Much More Interesting For The Listener!

I Believe Entertainment Can Aspire To Be Art, And Can Become Art, But If You Set Out To Make Art You're An Idiot.

My Fear Represented The Failure Of The Human System. It Is A Sad Truth Of Our Creation: Something Is Amiss In Our Design, There Are Loose Ends Of Our Psychology That Are Simply Not Wrapped Up. My Fears Were The Dirty Secrets Of Evolution. They Were Not Provided For, And I Was Forced To Construct Elaborate Temples To House Them.

Art As An Aesthetic Principle Was Supported By Thousands Of Years Of Discernment And Psychic Rewards, But Art As A Commodity Was Held Up By Air. The Loss Of Confidence That Affected Banks And Financial Instruments Was Not Affecting Cherubs, Cupids And Flattened Popes. The Objects Hadn't Changed: What Was There Before Was There After. But A Vacancy Was Created With The Clamoring Crowds Deserted And Retrenched.

It Was Easier To Sell A Painting That Was Not For Sale.

I Actually Credit Twitter With Fine-tuning Some Joke-writing Skills. I Still Feel Like I'm Working At It.

I Take Editing Seriously. It's A Joy To Edit. I Always Hand A Manuscript To Several Editors And Can't Wait To Get Back Their Notes And See What They've Said. I Don't Criticize Myself For Making Blunders Here And There, Because It's Just Natural. You Write In Chunks, And You May Not Remember That That Sentence You Wrote Yesterday Had The Same Word Repeated Three Times. I Do Enjoy That. I Love The Feeling Of Repairing. Repairing Is Really Nice.

It's Not The Size Of The Nose That Matters, It's What's Inside That Counts.

To Me, Torture Would Be, "i Can't Think What To Write In The Next Sentence. I'm Stuck." Torture Would Be If You Didn't Have The Next Idea.

I Didn't Worry If A Bit Got No Response, As Long As I Believed It Had Enough Response To Linger.

Private Companies Have A Lot Of Capital. They Can Run Things Efficiently And Get Projects Built.

When The Person Beside You Is Making You Alert And Keen And The Idea Of Being With Anyone Else Is Not Imaginable.

What I Mean Is That None Of My Talents Had A - What's That Great Word - Rubric. A Singer, An Actor, A Dancer - There Was Nothing I Could Really Say I Was. The Writing Came Much Later. And, Actually, Thank God, Because If I Had Said I'm A Singer, I Would Really Have Just Had One Thing To Do.

She Looked Down Again And I Was Stymied. I Sat. Oh, This Was Enough To Make Me Love Her, Because I Was Right With Her, Understanding Every Second And Longing To Step In. I Didn’t Even Need To Know The Specific That Was Troubling Her, Because To Me Her Halting Voice Easily Stood For The General Woe That Hangs In The Air, Even On Life’s Happiest Days.

How Is It Possible To Miss A Woman Whom You Kept At A Distance, So That When She Was Gone You Would Not Miss Her?

I Realized That Comedians Of The Day Were Operating On Jokes And Punch Lines. The Moment You Say The Punch Line, The Audience Either Laughs Sincerely Or They Laugh Automatically Or They Don't Laugh. The Thing That Bothered Me Was That Automatic Laugh. I Said, That's Not Real Laughter.

As Much As I Remember, I Just Thought, I Want To Sing A Song That Starts Normal And Ends Crazy.

Comedians Don`t Get Oscars, So I Gave Up On That A Long Time Ago. And I Can`t Really Speak About The Oscar-worthiness Of My Own Performance.

I Believe You Should Place A Woman On A Pedestal: High Enough So You Can Look Up Her Dress.

I Did A Lot Of Things When I First Started Out. In Order To Be In Show Business, I Juggled, I Did Magic Tricks, Cards Tricks And I Played The Banjo.

You Can't Really Conduct Your Life By One Or Two Phrases.

It's Very Hard Sometimes When You Can't Crack Something Or Can't Solve Something And You Keep Trying And Trying And You Know It's Falling A Little Bit Short. That's Very Hard, But Then When You Finally Do It, It's Very Rewarding And The Process Is Good Too, I Like Working With People This Way.

Or Is It That I Think Too Much?

I Really Enjoy Finding The Right Word, Creating A Good, Flowing Sentence. I Enjoy The Rhythm Of The Words.

She Is Nearing Forty And Not So Easily Forgiven As When Her Skin Bloomed Like Roses.

In My Opening Seconds, I Would Say, "it's Great To Be Here," Then Move To Several Other Spots On The Stage And Say, "no, It's Great To Be Here!" I Would Move Again: "no, It's Great To Be Here!

You Have To Get Comfortable [with Your Work], You Really Have To Know What You're Doing, And It Has To Be Almost Boring To You To Be Able To Do It Well.

My Most Persistent Memory Of Stand - Up Is Of My Mouth Being In The Present And My Mind Being In The Future: The Mouth Speaking The Line, The Body Delivering The Gesture, While The Mind Looks Back, Observing, Analyzing, Judging, Worrying, And Then Deciding When And What To Say Next. Enjoyment While Performing Was Rare - Enjoyment Would Have Been An Indulgent Loss Of Focus That Comedy Cannot Afford.

[her] Mind Blackens. The Blackness Is Not A Thought, But If It Could Be Pressed Into A Thought, If A Chemical From A Dropper Could Be Dripped Onto It Causing Its Color And Essence To Become Visible, It Would Take The Shape Of This Sentence: Why Does No One Want Me?

So, While Fitting In, She Was Like A Wicked Detail Standing Out Against A Placid Background.

I Don't Think Anyone Is Ever Writing So That You Can Throw It Away. You're Always Writing It To Be Something. Later, You Decide Whether It'll Ever See The Light Of Day. But At The Moment Of Its Writing, It's Always Meant To Be Something. So, To Me, There's No Practicing; There's Only Editing And Publishing Or Not Publishing.

My Problem Is That I Don't Get The Same Exhiliration From Success As I Get Depression From Failure.

I Always Felt The Audience Sorta Tolerated The Serious Musical Parts While I Was Doing My Comedy.

I Always Think Back To My High School Days And Realize All The People Who Were So Popular Then Are Nowhere Now And All The People Who Were Steadfast And Steady-going Are Somewhere. So High School Doesn't Necessarily Translate To Later In Life.

Talent Is The Ability To Say Things Well, But Genius Is The Ability To, Well, Say Things.

Be Undeniably Good. When People Ask Me How Do You Make It In Show Business Or Whatever, What I Always Tell Them & Nobody Ever Takes Note Of It 'cause It's Not The Answer They Wanted To Hear-what They Want To Hear Is Here's How You Get An Agent, Here's How You Write A Script, Here's How You Do This-but I Always Say, “be So Good They Can't Ignore You.” If Somebody's Thinking, “how Can I Be Really Good?” People Are Going To Come To You. It's Much Easier Doing It That Way Than Going To Cocktail Parties.

How Many People Have Never Raised Their Hand Before?

It's Funny That Some Ideas Start With A Little "what If?" And Then Suddenly You're Spending A Million Dollars To Shoot The Scene And Hoping That It Works.

She Tried To Get Even With Him Through Psychological Warfare But Couldn't, Because He Didn't Care.

Communication Has Changed So Rapidly In The Last 20 Years, It's Almost Impossible To Predict What Might Occur Even In The Next Decade. E-mail, Which Now Sends Data Hurtling Across Vast Distances At The Speed Of Light, Has Replaced Primitive Forms Of Communication Such As Smoke Signals, Which Sent Data Hurtling Across Vast Distances At The Speed Of Light.

Lots Of Women Are Getting Involved. They're Not Satisfied Just Being Passengers Anymore.

...the Divided World Of Aspen, Where Locals With A Sense Of Entitlement Were Pitted Against Developers With A Sense Of Condominiums.

Hosting The Oscars Is Much Like Making Love To A Woman. It's Something I Only Get To Do When Billy Crystal Is Out Of Town.

Mirabelle Is Attractive; It's Just That She Is Never The First Or Second Girl Chosen.

I Have Found That-- Just As In Real Life--imagination Sometimes Has To Stand In For Experience.

I Just Respected Comedians Whether They Were Or They Weren't, From, You Know, New Or Old.

Being On Twitter Is Like Having A Fern.

I Never Touched A Gun In My Life. That And That Alone Forever Doomed Me To Middle Management.

Middle Management

When You're Reaching For A Star, There's A Long Way To Fall.

The Overhead Lights Reflect In The Glass Countertop And Mingle In The Gray And Black Of The Gloves, Resulting In A Mother-of-pearl Swirl That Sometimes Sends Mirabelle Into A Shallow Hypnotic Dream.

I Wish I Could Do A Lot Of Things Different. I'm Not Going To Tell You What They Are, But If I Had A List Of All My Films Right Now, I'd Go, 'okay, I'll Cross That One Out And Cross That One Out And Cross That One Out And Cross That One Out.' Really. But I've Made Over 40 Films. How Can I Not Have Some Losers In There?

You Want To Be A Bit Compulsive In Your Art Or Craft Or Whatever You Do.

If You've Got A Dollar And You Spend 29 Cents On A Loaf Of Bread, You've Got 71 Cents Left; But If You've Got Seventeen Grand And You Spend 29 Cents On A Loaf Of Bread, You've Still Got Seventeen Grand. There's A Math Lesson For You.

There's A Big Difference Between The National Book Awards And The Academy Awards. At The Academy Awards You Can Feel The Greed And Envy And Ego. Whereas The National Book Awards Are In New York.

Love Is A Promise Delivered Already Broken.

Comedy May Be Big Business But It Isn't Pretty.

After One Of My Plays Came Out, I Had Mixed Reviews, Some Bad And Some Good. One Day, It Dawned On Me. I Thought, 'i Wrote A Play And He Wrote A Review, And That's The Difference Between Him And Me.'

Always Make Room For The Unexpected In Yourself.

A Celebrity Is Any Well-known Tv Or Movie Star Who Looks Like He Spends More Than Two Hours Working On His Hair.

Why Sip From A Tea Cup, When You Can Drink From The River.

It Was So Sweet Backstage, You Should Have Seen It - The Teamsters Were Helping Michael Moore Into The Trunk Of His Limo.

The Lure In Art Collecting And Its Financial Rewards, Not Counting For A Moment Its Aesthetic, Cultural And Intellectual Rewards, Is Like The Trust In Paper Money: It Makes No Sense When You Really Think About It. New Artistic Images Are So Vulnerable To Opinion That It Wouldn't Take Much More Than A Whim For A Small Group Of Collectors To Decide That A Contemporary Artist Was Not So Wonderful Anymore, Was So Last Year.

I Like All Kinds Of Music. I Listen To Abigail Washburn, The Punch Brothers, And Marc Johnson, The Great Clawhammer Player. I Also Listen A Lot To Sirius Radio, There's A Lot Of Bluegrass There.

You Know, You're Really Nobody In L.a. Unless You Live In A House With A Really Big Door.

Hello. I'm Hello, And I'd Like To Say Myself.

A Joke That Works Is Complete Knowledge In A Nanosecond.

The Conscious Mind Is The Editor, And The Subconscious Mind Is The Writer. And The Joy Of Writing, When You're Writing From Your Subconscious, Is Beautiful - It's Thrilling. When You're Editing, Which Is Your Conscious Mind, It's Like Torture.

I Do Think That Animated Films Have The Ability To Touch You Someplace. There Is Something About Live Action Movies That Is Different Because We Know The Characters Are Real People, So They Always Stay Flawed For Us Somehow. But Animated Films Touch Us In A Very Clear, Uncomplicated Place. They Have That Ability. And An Animated Character Can Make An Expression In A Way Humans Can't Do.

I Am A Wild And Crazy Guy!

Acting Has Helped Me Understand People, Not Only Because You Are Acting As A Character, But Also Because You Are Watching Other Actors Work. That Really Helps You Identify In Life When Someone Is Acting, Not Being True.

Working At The Magic Shop Really Gave Me A Sense Of Comedy Because It Was All Jokes.

She Didn't Even Finish Her Last Sentence; It Just Trailed Off. I Think The Subject Had Changed In Her Head While Her Mouth Had Continued On The Old Topic, Not Realizing It Was Out Of Supplies.

Talking About Music Is Like Dancing About Architecture.

I Was Not Self-destructive, Though I Almost Destroyed Myself. In The End, I Turned Away From Stand-up With A Tired Swivel Of My Head...

I Actually Learned About Sex Watching Neighborhood Dogs. And It Was Good. Go Ahead And Laugh. I Think The Most Important Thing I Learned Was: Never Let Go Of The Girl's Leg, No Matter How Hard She Tries To Shake You Off.

I Really Like The Animated Film Process. It's Kind Of Like Doing A Play, Because You Can Experiment With It, Rewrite It, Screen It, Go Back, Then Work On It A Little Bit More. If The Joke Doesn't Work, You Can Fix It. It's Different From A Live Action Movie.

Don't Have Sex Man. It Leads To Kissing And Pretty Soon You Have To Start Talking To Them.

The Banjo Is Such A Happy Instrument--you Can't Play A Sad Song On The Banjo - It Always Comes Out So Cheerful.

I Think When The Movie `roxanne' Came Out, Which I Also Had Written, I Felt Something New That I Never Felt, Which Was Respect.

With A Cheery Delicacy She Divided My Obsessions Into Three Categories: Acceptable, Unacceptable, And Hilarious.

At First I Had No Skills In Writing Comedy. I Didn't Know What A Joke Was, But, As Someone Once Told Me, Your Emotions Follow Your Intent. If You Create The Intention Of Starting A Comedy Act, Slowly Your Mind Starts Adjusting And You Arrive At A New Emotional State.

I Didn't Come From A Wealthy Family. I Had No Money. Maybe It Goes Back To Naivete Which Is Your Greatest Asset When You're Young. If I Was Starting In Comedy Today And If It Didn't Work The First Time, I'd Probably Quit. But I Kept At It, Kept At It.

He Never Complicates A Desire By Overthinking It, Unlike Mirabelle, Who Spins A Cocoon Around An Idea Until It Is Immobile.

I Used To Smoke Marijuana. But I'll Tell You Something: I Would Only Smoke It In The Late Evening. Oh, Occasionally The Early Evening, But Usually The Late Evening - Or The Mid-evening. Just The Early Evening, Midevening And Late Evening. Occasionally, Early Afternoon, Early Mid-afternoon, Or Perhaps The Late-midafternoon. Oh, Sometimes The Early-mid-late-early Morning. . . But Never At Dusk!

I Would Assign Every Lie A Color: Yellow When They Were Innocent, Pale Blue When They Sailed Over You Like The Sky, Red Because I Knew They Drew Blood. And Then There Was The Black Lie. That's The Worst Of All. A Black Lie Was When I Told You The Truth.

I Just Believe That The Interesting Time In A Career Is Pre-success, What Shaped Things, How Did You Get To This Point.

If You're Studying Geology, Which Is All Facts, As Soon As You Get Out Of School You Forget It All, But Philosophy You Remember Just Enough To Screw You Up For The Rest Of Your Life.

I've Run Into People In My Life Who Were So Dramatic; People Who Are So Extreme And So Frustrating To Be Around That You End Up Thinking About Them And Talking About Them For Literally Years After Your Experience With Them Is Over.

I Got A Flue Shot And Now My Chimney Works Perfectly.

As A Human Being On Earth, You Can't Imagine Friendship Not Being Important In Some Other Solar System Or Some Other Planet, Or Some Other Context Of Beings That Are Conscious. We Even See It In Animals. It Is Important For People On Earth To Reach Out Or Reach Into Someone.

If You Saw Her In These Moments, You Might Think She Was Collecting Her Thoughts In Order To Go Forward. But I See It Another Way: Her Mind Is Being Overwhelmed By Two Processes That Must Simultaneously Proceed At Full Steam. One Is To Deal With And Live In The Present World. The Other Is To Re-experience And Mourn Something That Happened Long Ago. It Is As Though Her Lightness Pulls Her Toward Heaven, But The Extra Gravity Around Her Keeps Her Earthbound.

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Virginia C. Andrews

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