Brian Regan Quotations

You can poke fun at some pretty difficult circumstances, and it's just a way to pop the bubble. I don't do that thing onstage usually, but offstage sometimes I might.

I try my jokes onstage. The only way to really find out if something is going to work is to try it on stage, and I try to be careful and bookend something new with a strong bit before and a strong bit afterwards. But it's fun to run on virgin snow. I like that feeling onstage of creating new footprints and not knowing what's going to happen.

The funnest jokes for me to tell are the ones that are the newest. So I'm just constantly motivated to keep my eyes and ears open and have new stuff.

Superhero power... I probably would just want to fly. I definitely would not want to be able to see through walls. I think walls are there for a reason. People put them up for a reason. You don't want to be looking through them. That would only cause nothing but misery and angst to know what's happening behind people's walls.

I wasn't expecting to really draw in respected comedians but it's going to happen along the way and I'm truly honored by that.

I am happy doing standup so I don't ever want to stop doing it. But I wouldn't mind venturing off and doing other things that are creative.

The only way I'd want to do something in television would be if it was about how I think as a comedian. I'd need to be able to be a creator. That's what I enjoy - I enjoy coming up with comedy, so it'd be very difficult for me to be sitting in a room and have somebody come in and say, "Here's your script! Learn these lines!" That's not fun. At least not for me.

When you're onstage, it's a communication technique when you make people laugh. You're communicating. You're communicating with other human beings and when they laugh you know that you're connecting. Laughing is an honest reaction and it's something that I can trust, and I love that feeling of knowing that I connected.

I like the honesty of standup comedy. People don't fake laugh. If they're truly laughing at you, you know they like you.

As long as I can make that audience one thing, one unit, then I'm okay with it. But, sometimes, the bigger the audience, the weirder it gets.

Sometimes you'll play, like, a large venue - maybe an outdoor venue or something - where it's so big that you can see all of the disinterested people. You see the audience, but then behind the audience you see people eating ice cream, going for a walk.

The bigger the show, the weirder it is.

The government will pay certain farmers to not grow corn. Wow. Where's my check? That'd be great. "Hey, what do you do for a living?" "Well, I don't grow corn. Get up at the crack of noon, make sure there's no corn growing. I'm gonna get up early tomorrow. And not plow. You know, we used to not grow tomatoes-but there's more money in not growing corn."

I saw something in the store the other day that I don't understand: that peanut butter and jelly in the same jar. Is there a point to that? I mean, I'm lazy-but I wanna meet the guy who needs that. Some guy going, "You know, I could go for a sandwich-but, uh, I'm not gonna open two jars. I can't be opening and closing all kinds of jars. Cleaning, who knows how many knives!?"

Every comedian works differently. Some comedians might do just observational stuff and they don't do anything personal, and other people.. everything they do is personal and they don't do any observational stuff at all. There's no right or wrong, it's just that everybody picks their own approach.

I'm capable offstage of having some dark, twisted thoughts but the kind of things I like to do onstage are just more conceptual and I don't even think of them as being clean. I don't sit down and think, "Man, I'm going to come up with some lily-white comedy!" They're just things that I like to talk about, and then at the end of the day you think, "Well, I guess that was clean" but it's not the focus.

A lot of the kind of comedy that I do comes out of real human moments. For them to work, they have to be truthful kinds of things that people in the audience can go, "Yes, I've experienced that myself!"

I'm always excited about my upcoming shows. I love what I do; I feel very lucky to be able to do what I do, and I never get tired of it. Every time I'm backstage before a show and I feel the murmur of the crowd, it's just incredibly exciting. And I consider myself very fortunate to be able to do this for a job. It's a great life.

I wanted to do the comic strip. I tried to get it syndicated, and I sent some examples to a syndication company, and they sent me a rejection letter! I wasn't smart enough at the time to realize you shouldn't let rejection letters stop you. I thought that rejection letter meant I was not allowed to be a cartoonist in this world, so I put the rejection letter down and said, well, I'll be a stand-up comedian.

I don't take jokes from other people. It's really not cool to steal jokes from anybody. It's not cool to steal anything from anybody. Jokes are no different.

Many comedians consider themselves to be cutting edge. But why do we have to use the knife for the analogy. Let's use the spoon. I like to consider myself the big bowl-like area of the spoon that holds all the stuff you like.

I don't always see humor in things. Especially when I smash my pinky toe into a coffee table leg in the middle of the night. But sometimes I'll see things, or experience things, that make me go, "Huh, maybe that's a bit."

Relevance is kind of a weird thing. If one does topical material, it makes sense to want to be relevant. But if someone talks about donut sprinkles, it's not quite as important. Unless the U.S. Supreme Court makes a decision outlawing donut sprinkles.

It's hard to program a computer to make jokes. The brain needs to do something here; the brain needs to come up with something bizarre to make something funny.

I'm honored that other comedians like what I do. That means the world to me. But at the same time when I'm on stage I'm not just trying to make the comedians laugh - I'm also trying to make the audience laugh. I want to make everybody laugh.

I just tend to think about everyday things for my onstage act. Actually you know what I like to talk about just the absolute most - the more mundane the subject matter, the more interesting it is to me.

Some people look at creamed corn and ask, 'Why?' I look at creamed corn and ask, 'Why not?'

I don't know. I'd be a lot better off if I would've studied more when I was growing up, you know?

Politicians have a lot to deal with these days. It's a different world. You know who I feel bad for? Arab Americans who truly want to get into crop dusting. Could be their life long dream, and every time they ask for a pamphlet, all hell breaks loose.

Don't let dialog about your company happen without your perspective.

How come they don't think you can handle a new story out of the blue on the TV news? They gotta make a little lame segue. "Hey, that's a big lotto jackpot! Speaking of lotto, there was a lot o' crime in the city today."

Hooked on Phonics worked for me

You see weird things driving... I've never understood log trucks. Sometimes you'll be out on the highway, you see two big giant trucks loaded up with logs, and they pass each other on the highway... I don't understand that. I mean, if they need logs over there... and they need 'em over there, you'd think a phone call would save 'em a whole lot of trouble.

I eat Fig Newtons by the sleeve!

I try to be careful not to put the cart before the horse. I try not to create comedy for other comedians to like. I want everybody to like it. I want audiences to like it, but I also want comedians to like it. I'm selfish. I want everybody to laugh!

I do a few jokes about the economy but from an everyday person perspective. People like to laugh, and they especially like to laugh during difficult circumstances.

Mmmm! Lunch and no clean up!! Can life get better? I submit that it CANNOT!!

I like to go on stage with a variety, with some stuff that's been around for a handful of years, some stuff from the last year, some stuff is from last week, and some stuff is brand spanking new. Those are the moments that excite me - when I'm coming up to a brand new bit. The more virgin the snow, the more fun it is to run on.

I try to be careful and put things in perspective. There are people who have challenging lives and work hard physically and mentally. I consider myself a lucky person because I get to go on stage and tell jokes for an hour. If I miss a connection here and there or my room isn't ready now and then? It's not a big deal.

Even though I have fond feelings for comedy clubs, I enjoy the focus you get in a theater. Comedy clubs are a different animal. People are being served nachos and there's a blender going off in the background.

Just make sure you're staying true to yourself, and do what you think is good in that craft or field [of yours] and then let everything else fall where it falls.

If a movie makes it really big, they do the obvious thing, right? They make an amusement park ride out of it. ... The connection is obvious. You get off, "Man, that was just like the movie! Only the movie had a storyline and characters, and that was a little more like a roller coaster."

I went to the juice isle, I learned something. Cranberries are taking over everything. What do you got, apples? Put some cranberrise in there, make it 50/50. Cran-apple. Grapes? Cran-grape. Mangos? Cran-mango. Pork chops? Cran-chop!

So when you do board, the first class people, they're sitting there. A lot of them are working as your boarding. They have computers out and calculators. They're looking up at you like, Hey, we're making money right now!

It means a lot to me to have my kids like what I do. And that's why I limit them. But I don't want to put that pressure on them to be a fan of mine.

I always hate having to use the gym equipment after these huge buff guys who move, like, the entire rack of plates. Then I get on, and move two plates, you know like: Clank! Clank! I'm the two plate guy! Clank! Clank! Anyone wanna spot me? Clank! Clank!

Don't like when sports interviewers force answers: Are you dedicating this game to your sick grandmother? What's the guy supposed to say?

My parents didn't know what to do with me. They got me into Little League Baseball, I played out in right field, cause I stunk.

I have a friend who swears by food combinations - have you heard of this nonsense? She's nuts. She's like, 'You know what? You should eat food combinations, and that way you can eat whatever you want. It's just the combinations of how you put the food together.' And then her examples are like, 'You wouldn't want to eat steak and potatoes together, but you could have, like, a lemon rind and raisin skins - not the whole raisin, take the skins and steam them.

I never learn. Like a waitress will bring my meal. Hey, enjoy your meal. You, too. But you don't have one, do ya? I'm a dufus. If you do eat enjoy it when you eat it if you have a break or something, later. If you get an opportunity. That's all I'm trying to say.

I don't sit down with a goal of writing. I read books or magazines. I watch TV. I go to the doctor. I get on airplanes. I live a normal life and sometimes I'll notice something or read things or experience things.

I eat like a kid. I like Chief Boyardee. Their Ravioli, but they have some stuff I've never seen in the real Italian food world. You ever been in a nice Italian restaurant? Hi how are you? Ummm id like to start with a nice bottle of Chanti and a couple of Caesar Salads and umm I'm going to have the Beef a'ronni. And some Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles for the lady.

So my doctor told me to watch what I'm eating - to read food labels. I'm in the store reading the Fig Newtons label: I've always liked Fig Newtons. I'm reading the label to make sure everything's fine: fat content. I looked at the serving size; two cookies. Who eats two cookies? I eat Fig Newtons by the sleeve: two sleeves is a serving size. I open them both and eat them like a tree chipper; Fig Newton shavings coming off the side.

I go in for the eye test, and I don't know about you, but I concentrate like crazy during the eye exam. You don't want to get no 'D' on that thing and end up with these big thick Coke bottle glasses.

If you tell a kid not to run to a water slide, he/she will walk for 2 steps, then start running again.

I took a speed reading course and my speed shot up to 43 pages a minute, but my comprehension plummeted.

I think the most horrible name for a crime has to be manslaughter. ... "I slaughtered a man! Just like a pig! Put him on a spit and put an apple in his mouth!"

I would have been a lot better off if I’d studied more when I was growing up, y’know. But you know where it all went wrong was the day they started the spelling bee. Because up until that day I was an idiot, but nobody else knew.

Like, I'm trying to make a statement that clean comedy is somehow better or loftier than dirty comedy, and I don't feel that way at all. I just think it's different. It's different. There's rock music, there's jazz music, there's reggae music: All of those forms are different.

Hey, you know who I feel bad for? Arab-Americans who truly want to get into crop dusting.

Be adaptable, flexible and never stop learning. The rate of change will never stop and neither should you.

I'm trying to do things I have never done. Like I recently went to 3 different ballets. And I loved trying to learn how to like those a little bit.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, we're about to begin boarding. If we could ask for your cooperation, please stay seated until you row has been called." ... That's what they say-but somehow, by the time it comes out of the speaker, it sounds like, "Everybody up and rush the door! Everybody up and try to squeeze your big fat butts in the small gate door area! Immediately! ... Do whatever you have to do to get on board. This is the last helicopter out of Vietnam!"

It’s good to be here. I’m just trying to go through life without looking stupid. It’s not working out too well.

I could go for a sandwich, but I’m not gonna open two jars.

Racquetball is the only sport where simultaneously you can be looking at the ball and it'll hit you in the back of the head at 90 miles per hour.

I think comedy is a good way to deal with anything. I hear about people in the hospital who are ill, and they use humor to help them through it. I think it's a great remedy for many things.

I think the serving size of ice cream is when you hear the spoon hit the bottom of the container.

If Einstein was so smart how come people only call you 'Einstein' when you do something really stupid ?

You know I could go for a sandwich, but uh, I'm not gonna open two jars. I can't be opening and closing all kinds of jars. And who knows how many knives!

The ultimate objective [of comedy] is to get a laugh, so if you can get a laugh off the fact that you did not get a laugh, then you've kinda saved the moment. Other professions don't have that luxury. You don't want to hear a brain surgeon say, "Man, am I so stupid! I cut on the wrong side of your head!!"

Do people who believe in reincarnation ever say, Darn, I'm still writing the year 1612 on my checks!

Can you imagine being bilingual? Or even knowing anybody that was? I'm not even unilingual. Actually, I shouldn't say that. I don't give myself enough credit. I know enough English to, you know, get by. I can order in restaurants and stuff.

If reading makes you smart then how come when you read a book they have to put the title of the book on the top of every single page? Does anyone get halfway through a book, What the hell am I reading?

I'm actually kinda quiet off stage, a lotta people don't realize that, I was at a dinner party recently, a bunch of people that I don't know, one guy talking plenty for everybody, Me myself right and then I and then myself and mee me I couldn't tell this one about I cause I was talking about myself and Me- Meee- Mee- Me- Me! Beware the me monster.

Do not stand directly in front of a cannon...how true that is.

You ever say a phrase you say all the time at the wrong time, feel like a complete idiot? Something like, 'You, too. You, too.' I was getting out of the cab at the airport, and the driver goes, 'Hey, have a nice flight.' 'You, too. You, too. You have a nice flight, too - in case you ever fly some day.

I did some writing for that movie. The remake of Planet of the Apes. I didn't write the script. But I wrote some lines that they ended up... not using. ... I wrote one line. I thought it would've been perfect. I don't know if anyone saw the movie. It's the scene where the ape general comes in. And they're trying to decide if they should attack right there, or wait until a little later. And I wrote: "Man these bananas are good!" But they didn't use it. I did all of that research.

I saw this sign posted once, it said, "Blasting Zone Ahead." Wow. Shouldn't that read: "Road Closed?" What do you mean there's a blasting zone? What am I supposed to do? "Hey-uh, you might wanna buckle up. Blasting zone coming up. Yeah. Just saw the sign. Put the helmets on back there! Yeah I think we're- (Pow!)- Oh! We're getting close! (Pow!)- Oh! This is gonna be a bad blasting zone! Remember that last one-we lost Billy?"

If you were to second guess your decision to book some time to visit an Indian community, that would be a reservation reservation reservation.

Why are people getting on elevators shocked to find people getting off elevators?

I drove myself to the Emergency Room. That's a nice relaxing drive. "Noooo, after you. Merge-everybody merge."

I hate getting off the elevator on the wrong floor? Anyone ever do that... and then you have to turn around and face those people. I feel like I owe everyone in there an explanation.

I hate the phrase “One thing led to another”. What kind of lazy writing is that? Isn't it your job as a writer to tell me how that made this happen? “Adolf Hitler was rejected as a young man in his application to an art school. One thing led to anotherand the United States ended up dropping two atomic bombs on the sovereign nation of Japan”.

A formula for comedy is comedy equals tragedy plus time. A difficult or uncomfortable situation takes place, and then you laugh about it later down the road.

The big yellow one is the sun!

I don't know what in the hell's going on with cranberries, but they're getting in all the other juices. Whoever the salesman is for cranberries is doing a great job. He's showing up everywhere. Hey, what do you got, some apples? Put some cranberries in there. We'll call it cran-apple and go 50-50. What do you got grapes? How about cran-grape. What do you got mangos? Cran-mango. What do you got pork chops? Cran-chops. Why don't you back off, cran-man. Why don't you take your sales trophy and have a vacation.

I was at the breakfast table this morning and I read in the newspaper that more and more adults are living at home with their parents. That surprised me, I was like Mom did you read this?

I thought yoga was easy - I went out and I bought a yoga video tape. I bought the beginners' yoga tape. I couldn't do anything on the whole hour - nothing - just fast forwarding: can't do that, can't do that - I know I can't do that. This woman in a soothing voice: 'Simply take the bottom of your right foot and place it on the small of your back.

They always say that Albert Einstein was a genius. Then how come when anyone ever calls you that, it's an insult? 'You don't know where you parked the car? Good job, Einstein.' I don't think we're honoring that man properly by using his name in vain in parking lots.

I was watchin' the news the other day, and I heard them talking about a criminal named Brian Regan same spelling and everything. He's gonna be in jail for the rest of his life. So I'm sitting there doing a crossword puzzle and all of a sudden I hear, It is unknown whether the charges against Brian Regan will lead to his execution. Guess I can put this down. Honey, did we pay that parking ticket?!

You can microwave a Pop Tart. That just blew me away that you could do that. How long does it take to toast a Pop Tart? A minute and a half if you want it dark? People don't have that kind of time? Listen, if you need to zap-fry your Pop Tarts before you head out the door, you might want to loosen up your schedule.

Go my favorite sports team go! Score a goal. Unit. Basket. Go squadron! Defeat the opponents soundly in this...skirmish.

You know what's fun? You pick somebody at random, like out of the phone book, and send them about 100 'Just Because' cards. They can't even ask you why you did it.

The owner tends to source these things separately,

I saw this sign posted once, it said, 'blasting zone ahead'. Wow... shouldn't that read: Road Closed. What do you mean there's a blasting zone, what am I supposed to do, 'Hey-- ah, you might wanna buckle up, blasting zone coming up. Yeah. Just saw the sign. Put the helmets on back there! Yeah I think we're-- (Pow!)-- Oh! We're getting close! (Pow!)-- Oh! This is gonna be a bad blasting zone! Remember that last one--we lost Billy?

A small business doesn't have an HR director, usually,

I am willing to commit espionage against the United States by providing your country with highly classified information.