Ray Romano Quotations

If my father had hugged me even once, I'd be an accountant right now.

Everyone should have kids. They are the greatest joy in the world. But they are also terrorists. You'll realize this as soon as they are born and they start using sleep deprivation to break you.

Right after 'Raymond' I had a world-is-my-oyster attitude, but I found out I don't like oysters. I had this existential emptiness. 'What is my purpose? Who am I?' I had a big identity crisis.

The successful golfers - they're like astronauts or pilots. They have that demeanor that they can focus and stay within that one moment and nothing distracts them. That's not me.

Whenever I walk off the golf course, I thank God that I'm able to tell a joke. I thank God I'm good at something.

I still feel like an immature idiot inside, but I look in the mirror and - as a friend of mine once said- this old guy keeps getting in the way.

I don't want to say work is who I am, but some people feel more centered and more whole when they're producing and creating.

In school, I wasn't a very good student - I was very irresponsible and never did the studying but always liked to get the laugh.

I don't think men talk as much as women, but when we have something on our minds we'll get it out.

If golf wasn't enjoyable and there wasn't a lot of humor and enjoyment, even though the game is so frustrating, you would wonder why you put yourself through it.

The first time I played golf was in Flushing Meadows, Queens, when I was about 16 or 17. They had an 18-hole pitch-and-putt. My buddies and I would hop the fence and sneak on and play.

I don't want to be a spokesman for family values, but that's the way my standup is perceived.

The best comedy, I feel, comes in a drama because it balances each other out.

When you go to standup, there seems to be a common denominator of some form of need or want for validation from the audience that maybe you were lacking as a kid.

I'm aging, and the world is seeing it.

I can't complain about my career, that's for sure.

I have the show because I'm insecure. It's my insecurity that makes me want to be a comic, that makes me need the audience.

It seems to be a common denominator with a lot of comics, this low self-esteem thing.

The comics that are just conversing with you up there and drawing on their own life, yeah, I guess so. I guess some do political humor, some do topical humor, but the ones that I like, the ones that are appealing to me, were guys who were just talking to you about their life.

I do still get intimidated by certain things.

I feel like this is a dream - and I apologize for how I dressed some of you.

I lived at home till I was 29.

I would get my student loans, get money, register and never really go. It was a system I thought would somehow pan out.

The only thing I miss from the sitcom format is that immediate gratification of when you're, if we're talking about comedy, of the live audience.

We want to recognize that it is the end of the show without really saying it. But we'll satisfy the audience's desire for a little heart.

I'm a little different from the average dude because I'm on high-def TV now.

I feel very privileged that I am able to do something. All of us saw the images on TV and we said we can send money but we still wanted to contribute more.

He missed a shot and got frustrated and accidentally hit himself on the head with his own putter and needed stitches on the course. It was hysterical, ... He continued playing. He didn't get hurt. It wasn't serious.

We couldn't land right away there was a dog on the runway,

We see another chapter in his life, you know, not to give it away. But he goes to another place. And, of course, there's a lot of adventure and craziness.

We could send our money but we still feel we could contribute more.

I've always wondered, what am I going to do that's important with these stupid jokes that I tell.

I wanted to do something different, but it's a weird transition you're making here. You're trying to get the audience to come with you.

It was a shock to win, ... Even you guys - admit it - you thought 'Desperate Housewives' was going to win.

It is our swan song, and (winning) kind of symbolizes the closure at the end, and I miss it already. I'm gonna go bawl now.

It's my insecurity that makes me want to be a comic, that makes me need the audience.

If you ever want to go golfing, take Brad with you. He will make you look better, ... He came in dead last. There were 75 celebrities and pro athletes and he came in dead last.

By the way, good luck, and if that does happen and you need the brother to make a guest appearance, I'm more than happy to help.

I don't know if I will do that, ... I love stand-up and I haven't given it up.

Mick Jagger also a music connoisseur and knows everything about that era. So, you knew the music side was going to be top-notch. It's HBO. On Men of Certain Age, if we wanted a song, it would break the bank. But, Vinyl can go all-out.

I was at home waiting for projects. I was on Parenthood and there was one season left, and I was thinking, "What's next?" I'm at this age where I'm trying to write my own script, and they sent this over and I decided to put myself on tape.

It was very nerve-wracking for me. I had to be drunk and have a threesome. I'm not that guy. Bobby Cannavale is that guy. But it was Vegas and things got crazy, and it happened. We go to Vegas to try to sign Elvis Presley and things get crazy. My character [in Vinyl] is stoned.

I had to be naked [in Vinyl], but I was almost more nervous about having to be drunk. The director wasn't going to yell, "Too big!," during the nude scene. For the drunk scene, you can be bad drunk or good drunk. We'll see. My wife was not happy, hearing about it.

As an actor, that's nerve-wracking enough [drunk and doing coke] because you have to do it at the right level.

For a sitcom sex scene, you get in bed and that's the end of the scene. It quick and it was fast, but it was foreign territory for me. Not for Bobby. Bobby Cannavale has been down that road before. With my character, I think it will be a one-and-out. I don't think you'll see my character [in Vinyl] naked again, so relax everybody.

I put myself on tape and the cool thing was that Martin Scorsese had never heard of me. He had never seen [Everybody Loves Raymond]. I was just an unknown actor to him. I don't want to sound conceited, like he has to know who I am, but that seemed a little odd. He's a film genius. He doesn't watch sitcoms.

I'd rather be in Las Vegas 104 degrees than New York 90 degrees, you know why? Legalized prostitution. In any weather that takes the edge off.

If I'm really considering doing film from now on then that is the smart thing to do, or you can go either way. You can just do the same character over and over again and make a different comedy like over and over again.

Parents, just keep in mind that kids will always round off to the nearest obscenity..

Every parent knows that for a kid, the car is chloroform..

People are going to see both of us and think it's an Abbott and Costello kind of thing. It's not an easy switch. It's not an easy transition from TV to film.

Failure-it centers me. Too much success has me thinking, All right, what's goin' on?

Nothing like a little chest pain to restore your faith.

If a guy's ever telling you a four-hour sex story with a straight face, just feel sorry for him. Not for lying to you, but for lying to himself. As a matter of fact, stop him right in the middle of the story and just hug him. Nine times out of ten he'll just break down and cry. He knows you know.

Flappers sounds like where waitresses go after they're too old to work at Hooters.

My wife gets so jealous. She came home from work and was mad at me because there was a pretty girl on the bus she thought I would have liked.

I have this mistress: show business. I get a lot of love and adulation from outside, and [my wife] lets me have that, while she does all the real-life stuff that counts — making sure the kids are going to school and all that. I married a saint — well, a saint who curses.

In a way, comedy is like sex. The more noise you hear, the better you think you're doing.

I was wracked with insecurity.

I have this mistress: show business.

You don't want to shock them and do something totally opposite, but you also want to play a different character.

After 'Raymond,' there was this big feeling of, 'What do I do next?'

I do what I do because I love it.

I want to do well and I want to fit in.

I still got my hair, I'm not fat.

I love standup and I haven't given it up.

I like doing film, you know, single-camera.

I just don't want to play the same guy again over and over.

I've had people say to me, 'Look at the sky, the fields, the ocean, the beautiful sunset. Isn't that proof positive of God?' Following that line of thought, look at the magnificent rainbows after a big rainstorm. Isn't that proof positive that God is gay?

My career has been my craziest adventure.

You have to remember: the wife been home all day cleaning asses and feeding faces. Sometimes the opposite.

My theory has always been that everyone in show business is there because they were deprived of some attention as a child.

Each day it's like: 'How many more days am I going to feel young and vibrant? I feel young and vibrant now, but I also feel the aches and pains a little bit.

The married man has all but eliminated that worry from his life, simply because his wife knows all about him: the good, the bad, and the tiny.

I love hitting into the rough because it gets me close to the people.

You know, a TV show is a slow build.

It's starting to feel good, although I don't like feeling too good - that's not where my comedy comes from.

The fact that they let me in a movie with Gene Hackman has left me with no faith in show buisness.

Without identical twins, you'll never get to experience entering a hotel room with one of them and watching him run into the full-length mirror because he though he saw his brother.

That's the one thing I have over any twenty-one-year-old: a proud history of accumulated neuroses. That's the game in which I'm da man.

My kids are growing up and it's hard to accept they are their own person and they're independent.

Why can't I love him (a 2 yr old nephew) from afar? That's how I want to love him - through pictures and folklore.

My wife said to me 'I hope you win... but if you do and you go up and say you love me, don't think it makes up for never saying it when we're alone.

Mike Royce and I have always had success writing what we know. What we know now is that we're middle-aged, neurotic and fat.

I'm always giving myself the Alzheimer's test. My shrink told me to do this. It takes one minute. You name every word that comes to mind that begins with the letter F.

I did 15 shows a week when I lived in New York. I did five shows on a Friday and seven shows on a Saturday. It was everything I did and it was my sole source of income.

Sex after one child shows down. After twins... ooh... I'll tell you what it is for us. I'll share it with you. Every three months. We don't plan it that way. That's just how it works out. It's the weirdest thing. You know what I do? Every time I have sex, the next day I pay my estimated tax. My quarterlies are due. If it's oral sex, I renew my driver's license.

I am like Hugh Hefner minus anything good about his life.

My daughter's tricycle said "Some Assembly Required." It came in a jar.

I had a very Italian house - the "plastic furniture you couldn't sit on" house. Did anybody have the museum house? For a kid it's traumatic. Towels you can never touch. China no one's ever gonna use. Everything is for a special occasion that never happens. My mother was waiting for the Pope to show up for dinner. Or Sinatra. Or Chachi.

If you are someone, you know, with fame, whatever amount, it's good to be married to someone who's not impressed with that at all.

My wife gets all the money I make. I just get an apple and clean clothes every morning.

You know, before I would think, my cab driver hates me. Now I think my limo driver hates me.

When you wake up one day and say, "You know what? I don't think I ever need to sleep or have sex again." Congratulations, you're ready (to have children).

I do know its important to keep the romantic spark alive in your marriage. But with four kids, sometimes it's enough just to keep yourself alive.

People think living in your parents' basement until you're twenty-nine is lame. But what they don't realize is that while you're there, you save money on rent, food, and dates.

Well, I'm a 14 handicap. Anyone who golfs knows what that means.

That's when you know you're a true married couple: when you have to apologize for what you did in her dream.

I wasn't really that informed about the two-year-old. Oh, I'd read about them, and occasionally I'd see documentaries on the Discovery Channel showing two-year-olds in the wild, where they belong..

The more I go through parenting, the more I say I owe my mother an apology.