The TV business is uglier than most things. It is normally perceived as some kind of cruel and shallow money trench through the heart of the journalism industry, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free and good men die like dogs, for no good reason.

Stand-up can take you in so many different places, man. So many doors can be opened up from stand-up comedy, and the first one that was opened up for me was acting.

I’ve seen too many ups and downs in the movie industry.

There’s no difference between movies and television. None at all. Except in a lot of cases, television’s much better than movies.

You’ve gotta understand that with branding and the way things are promoted, in our day and age, your older movie stars are not reachable or accessible because they’re not a part of the whole social media world.

The great thieves lead away the little thief.

I have a lot of friends who do what I do. Either they’re actresses or singers or things like that.

I’ve taken so many kids out of Pittsburgh and onto the great white way in New York City right into a Broadway show.

There are a lot of conservative people, a lot of moderate people, Republicans, Democrats, in Hollywood. It is just that the conservative people by the nature of the word itself play closer to the vest. They do not go around hot dogging it.

One of the reasons I connect to the Super Bowl is that I approach my shows like an athlete.

War is a quarrel between two thieves too cowardly to fight their own battle.

A lot of dumb pictures have made a lot of money, but that doesn’t mean they’re going to be anything cinema students will revel over in the future.

If I’d married someone in show business, there’d be too much competition.

In Hollywood, a lot of times when something is in development, it just takes a lot of time.

I stopped watching TV because of ‚The Wire.‘ Like, ‚The Wire‘ ruined everything for me because I don’t even want to watch anything else now.

How do people relate to movies now, when they’re on portable devices or streaming them? It’s not as much about going to the movies. That experience has changed.

In Hollywood the woods are full of people that learned to write but evidently can’t read. If they could read their stuff, they’d stop writing.

Doing Saturday Night Live definitely affects my relationship with my girlfriend and with my family, because you feel so much pressure to do well that night. But I think everyone’s grown to accept that and so they give me my space at the show.

You know, fame is a funny thing, man, especially, you know, actors, musicians, rappers, rock singers, it’s kind of a lifestyle and it’s easy to get caught up in it – you go to bars, you go to clubs, everyone’s doing a certain thing… It’s tough.

I now have two different audiences. There’s the one that has been watching my action films for 20 years, and the American family audience. American jokes, less fighting.

If I close my eyes and think of Hollywood, all I see is one big varicose vein.

I know I’m more on television, and I’m more recognisable than maybe even the players because they run and train, but I just stand there, and my face does all these funny things that everyone can see all the time.

I want to try something different in Hollywood, to tell the audience I am not just an actor star – I am an actor, too.

I did the Ed Sullivan show four times. I did the Steve Allen show. I did the Jackie Gleason show.

I want to be an executive producer.

I’m proud to be an actor. See, as an actor, you live longer. Football players, the brain and all that stuff, ooh-eee, that’s not good.

In those days, the early 1980s, TV and film were interchangeable.

I know that a large part of my fan base is gay. They’ve shown me love from the start. I mean in this industry, everyone from my glam people to my dancers are gay. You can’t be homophobic in this line of work – I’m a pop star!

Actor’s life is very long.

I’ve always felt toward the slightest scene, even if all I had to do in a scene was just to come in and say, ‚Hi,‘ that the people ought to get their money’s worth and that this is an obligation of mine, to give them the best you can get from me.

There’s this lingering philosophy that movie stars shouldn’t do TV.

Persuasion is achieved by the speaker’s personal character when the speech is so spoken as to make us think him credible. We believe good men more fully and more readily than others: this is true generally whatever the question is, and absolutely true where exact certainty is impossible and opinions are divided.

In Los Angeles, everyone is a star.

In California, they don’t throw their garbage away – they make it into TV shows.

Thieves respect property. They merely wish the property to become their property that they may more perfectly respect it.

It is always good men who do the most harm in the world.

What I like about Elvis is the same thing I like about James Brown, Michael Jackson, Prince. These guys, back in the day, there was no smoke and mirrors. It was just raw talent. They would step out onstage and command an audience. Talk about awesome.

You just wait. I’m going to be the biggest Chinese Star in the world.

Actors know what actors are insecure about – and they’re all insecure.

I’m already the face of the UFC, plus the face of boxing, WWE, and Hollywood.

Film is a very tight little box. If you don’t fit in that box, you’re gone. Television, there’s more room to move around.

Hollywood is not suited for me, and I am not suited for it.

I have no interest in Shakespeare and all that British nonsense… I just wanted to get famous and all the rest is hogwash.

Actors are one family over the entire world.

Only the public can make a star. It’s the studios who try to make a system out of it.

A film is sort of binary – it either works or it doesn’t work. It has nothing to do with how good a job you do. If you bring it up to an adequate level where the audience goes with the movie, then it works, that is all.

When I got into this, I never thought about reviews. I never thought about what people would say about me, I was just a young guy who was excited to become a comedian and an actor, and I just wanted to get to do what I got to do.

There are no record companies in Waikiki.

Good men must not obey the laws too well.

In Hollywood a girl’s virtue is much less important than her hairdo.

We were on for six years. We were in syndication for a while. It had its run. I still see the people from ‚Mr. Belvedere,‘ too. We stay in touch.

I’m always amazed by the people who work on stage who sing night after night, day after day, week in week out.

I think, first of all, I don’t think people understand Ice Cube’s body of work. Ice Cube is a, and I hate to use the word ‚urban‘ but – when you think of Judd Apatow, and a person who’s launched so many careers, Ice Cube has done that for so many comedians, you know?

It’s no secret that we were sticking just about every nickel we had on the chance that people would really be interested in something totally new and unique in the field of entertainment.

When I was on TV in the ’80s, I wasn’t thinking, ‚There’s a 10-year-old kid watching this and in 15 years, he’s gonna be doing stuff that was influenced by me.‘ I was trying to get my five minutes together. So now that those people are comedians and they’re influenced by me – it’s bizarre.

I laugh all the time – at things, people, stuff, whatever. But, I don’t laugh onstage because then it’s serious business.

I don’t think the money people in Hollywood have ever thought I was normal, but I am dedicated to my work and that’s what counts.

The dominant theory coming out of Hollywood is that peoples‘ attention spans are getting shorter and shorter and they need more stimulation.

She’s a total professional, a diva, a mega-star, not just in music but in the entertainment industry. You always learn from the greats, and J.Lo is one.

Celebrity is ridiculous and silly and it’s mad that people like me are listened to – you know, rap stars and movie stars.

If anything, a lot of electronic music is music that no one listens to at home, hardly. It’s really only to be heard when everyone’s out enjoying it.