131 Quotes by Harry Shearer

The theater business is very much about “Hey, if you want our big blockbuster at Christmas time, you’ll play our piece of crap in April.”

If you’re going to do something that lasts 90 minutes, you can’t really do it with stick figures.

You’re not just looking for laughs, but you’re trying to do the characters first, and then the laughs come afterwards.

In the year and a half I was on SNL, I never saw anybody ad lib anything. For a very good reason – the director cut according to the script. So, if you ad libbed, you’d be off mike and off camera.

You know, radio was a really easy way to do the shows. You’d come in, do a read-through, there’d be a few rehearsals, then you’d come the night of the show and do it in front of the audience and then go home.

Anybody who says that having the public recognize them and relate to the work they do is irritating should get into another line of work. You’re in this business for people to know what you do and like it.

I’m not sure that there’s anybody else that’s as psychologically complex and who’s given us this window into his soul that Nixon gave us. That’s what I find absolutely addictive and seductive.

That's life's big joke: we all end up looking like Mr. Burns.

I am one of those people who thrive on deadlines, nothing brings on inspiration more readily than desperation.