Keenen Ivory Wayans Quotes

There is nothing more joyful to me than hearing a live audience laugh. Especially when I planned it that way!

Comedians like to see people smile. With acting, I love giving people a feeling, an emotion. I like to give people a feeling. When they come away from my scene, I want them to think.

I remember once having to stop performing when I thought an elderly man a few rows back from the front was actually going to die because he was laughing so hard.

One of the things that makes any good entertainment, whether it's a play, drama, comedy, television, film, whatever, is that you feel a certain amount of spontaneity.

But with comedy it's a simple premise. If it's funny, people laugh. If it's not, they don't.

How can you get bored if the audience is cheering and laughing at something you're doing?

Comedy is difficult for an actor. But I think I have a good sense of humor and manage to make people laugh and make them happy.

Comedy is like math - you can check your answer because you know you've gotten it right if you get a laugh. It just makes sense to me. I feel like because I've had to keep that tool in my box for so long, I'm ready to show it off a bit.

It's good to be funny when you are a comedian.

I'm always trying to make myself laugh. I'm the most enthusiastic audience I'm likely to find, so if it doesn't make me smile then it probably won't work on you. The jokes that only make me shrug get cut.

I've grown as a storyteller, and my comedic timing has gotten better.

When you're a storyteller, part of the process of storytelling is the kind of communion you form with the audience to whom you're telling your story. If some segment of the audience doesn't like that story, it doesn't feel good.

The test of a real comedian is whether you laugh at him before he opens his mouth.

There are these showcase clubs where 14 guys will go on in a row and people are laughing at everything, and I'm like - 'I can't laugh that much. That's so weird to me.'

I really loved what I was doing being creative and being funny as a stand-up comedian.

If you are a great dramatic actor then you often don't know if people are enjoying your stuff at all because they are sitting there in silence. But with comedy it's a simple premise. If it's funny, people laugh. If it's not, they don't.

I want my readers to feel, to think, sometimes to laugh. But most of all I want them to enjoy a good read.

I think people tend to feel odd when I do my act. Unless you are an ironic person, it's not a good place for you to be.

When you improvise, you work off the laughs from the audience, but when you step on stage to do standup, it's silent.

A lot of the time, you're supposed to play to the top of your intelligence, as truthful as possible. But when you're on stage making people laugh, you're still acting. I think it helped me a bunch to go on stage two or three times a week.

I'm drawn to a good story, really, as I hope most people are. For me, it's the story that's going to stay with you eventually, not necessarily the genre. I go to watch a film because of the story, not because it was a Western or a comedy.

Drama is easy. Comedy's hard.

Comedy is tragedy plus timing.

There aren't many laughs in that and I remember doing a look and everybody laughed and I just thought, wow, that's incredible how you can do that. So I did another look and they laughed again and then I remember thinking, hold on, this isn't right for this piece, you've got to stop it.

I think comedy is one of the hardest things to pull off. You either have timing or you don't, and that's something I don't have for sure.