Steve Martin Quotes
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The only thing that bothers me is if I'm in a restaurant and I'm eating and someone says, 'Hey, mind if I smoke?' I always say, 'No. Mind if I fart?
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I choose a project based on whether it feels worthwhile working on when it comes to me. But secondly I choose it if it sounds like fun. Projects are determined by just how they strike me at the moment, as they have done throughout my whole life.
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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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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.
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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.
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There's someone out there for everyone - even if you need a pickaxe, a compass, and night goggles to find them.
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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?
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A kiss may not be the truth, but it is what we wish were true.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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Anyone who's ever worked with Meryl Streep always says the same thing: can that woman act! And what's with all the Hitler memorabilia?
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Some nights, alone, he thinks of her, and some nights, alone, she thinks of him. Some night these thoughts, separated by miles and time zones, occur at the same objective moment, and Ray and Mirabelle are connected without ever knowing it.
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In a strange way, I don't have a job, so I have a lot of time on my hands. When I do work, it might be very concentrated, and it might be months where you're not really doing anything except maybe playing the banjo or writing something. You know, there's a lot of time in the day if you're not working 9 to 5.
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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...
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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?
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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.
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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.
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Mirabelle is attractive; it's just that she is never the first or second girl chosen.
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The greatest thing you can do is surprise yourself.
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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.
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Well, today the Grammys is much much better than the Oscars. I think the differences in the shows are that the Grammys are much wilder. The Oscars is much more people in the industry. And people dress wilder, I think, at the Grammys.
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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.
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I have heard it said that a complicated childhood can lead to a life in the arts. I tell you this story of my father and me to let you know I am qualified to be a comedian.