Quotees Archive

I think I did pretty well, considering I started out with nothing but a bunch of blank paper.

- Steve Martin

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.

- Steve Martin

I think there are people out there writing original bluegrass songs, but it’s hard to get them out on the air.

- Steve Martin

I think when I was young, let’s call it high school, and even before that, I just loved comedy, and I loved comedians. I grew up watching Laurel and Hardy. That’s really a long time ago. I loved Jerry Lewis. I just loved comedians.

- Steve Martin

I first thought maybe I’d do a banjo presentation record, where I’d play a couple of songs and get a bunch of other players to do the rest. Then I realized I had enough of my own songs to do an album of them.

- Steve Martin

I believe that Ronald Reagan will someday make this country what it once was… an arctic wilderness.

- Steve Martin

I believe that sex is one of the most beautiful, natural, wholesome things that money can buy.

- Steve Martin

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 some way.

- Steve Martin

I did stand-up comedy for 18 years. Ten of those years were spent learning, four years were spent refining, and four years were spent in wild success. I was seeking comic originality, and fame fell on me as a byproduct. The course was more plodding than heroic.

- Steve Martin

I don’t like to look back, and I’m always worried about the next thing rather than resting on the laurels or the degradations of the last thing.

- Steve Martin

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.

- Steve Martin

I feel good about being able to take bluegrass on to television like ‘Letterman’ and ‘The View,’ and I’ve heard nice things about being able to do that. I really haven’t felt any negativity toward me or my music.

- Steve Martin

I got a flue shot and now my chimney works perfectly.

- Steve Martin

I have thought about some kind of musical involving my music. That would be kind of interesting. I have thought of it in that way, as a creator of something, not so much a performer. So that’s in my head.

- Steve Martin

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.

- Steve Martin

I loved to make people laugh in high school, and then I found I loved being on stage in front of people. I’m sure that’s some kind of ego trip or a way to overcome shyness. I was very kind of shy and reserved, so there’s a way to be on stage and be performing and balance your life out.

- Steve Martin

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.

- Steve Martin

I love technology, and I love science. It’s just always all in the way you use it. So there’s no – you can’t really blame anything on the technology. It’s just the way people use it, and it always has been.

- Steve Martin

I love comedy. That’s what got me into the arts. I don’t even know how to categorize myself anymore.

- Steve Martin

I like the idea that one thing leads to another. You can tweet something completely innocuous, and then find yourself going off on a tangent that’s inspired by a response.

- Steve Martin

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.

- Steve Martin

I like a woman with a head on her shoulders. I hate necks.

- Steve Martin

I just believe that the interesting time in a career is pre-success, what shaped things, how did you get to this point.

- Steve Martin

I knew I could only play Cyrano if he were Americanized. I had no intention of writing the script myself. I was afraid of it. You’re playing with fire when you tamper with a classic. So I went looking for a writer. But it was such a personal idea, and anyone I would give it to would make it his own. It’s hard to ask Neil Simon to write your idea.

- Steve Martin

A record isn’t like a movie – you can get it together pretty fast.

- Steve Martin

An apology? Bah! Disgusting! Cowardly! Beneath the dignity of any gentleman, however wrong he might be.

- Steve Martin

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.

- Steve Martin

Bad psychoanalysis would say I enjoyed pleasing people, working really hard and pleasing people, which is probably related to my father in some way. But I really liked working hard. When I worked at Disneyland, I’d do 12 hours straight and go home thrilled.

- Steve Martin

Boy, those French: they have a different word for everything!

- Steve Martin

Chaos in the midst of chaos isn’t funny, but chaos in the midst of order is.

- Steve Martin

Comedy may be big business but it isn’t pretty.

- Steve Martin

Dinosaurs did not walk with humans. The evolutionary record says different. They gambled.

- Steve Martin

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.

- Steve Martin

Don’t have sex man. It leads to kissing and pretty soon you have to start talking to them.

- Steve Martin

Everything is fraught with danger. I love technology and I love science. It’s just always all in the way you use it. So there’s no – you can’t really blame anything on the technology. It’s just the way people use it, and it always has been.

- Steve Martin

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.

- Steve Martin

I actually credit Twitter with fine-tuning some joke-writing skills. I still feel like I’m working at it.

- Steve Martin

I believe entertainment can aspire to be art, and can become art, but if you set out to make art you’re an idiot.

- Steve Martin

A day without sunshine is like, you know, night.

- Steve Martin