David Hyde Pierce Quotes

While trying to protect the republic, the conspirators in Julius Caesar enable Mark Antony to triumph. In Rose Rage, the more Henry VI tries to fix things, the more they go wrong.

George W. Bush has dutifully, if not intentionally, provided Americans with laughs for nearly a decade. He has also made them cry, sometimes for the same reason.

To paraphrase Oedipus, Hamlet, Lear, and all those guys, "I wish I had known this some time ago.

I just heard a very funny story about somebody who died yesterday, I'm sorry to say so but it was so absurd that you can't help laughing. And the person that was concerned about that story was laughing too.

I think reading Shakespeare's plays when I was young was extremely important. He had the ability to make utter strangers come alive.

We have first raised a dust and then complain we cannot see.

Do not ask for what you will wish you had not got.

If Shakespeare thought comedy worthwhile, that means the rest of us can take a break from tragedy now and then without betraying our calling, even if the modern professional intellectual, a poseur by nature, has yet to discover this.

The constituents of tragedy may be universally acknowledged, easily invoked and deeply felt, but the elements of comedy are, I think, more widely variable from person to person.

Shakespeare's stories are still very strong. He structured fantastic stories about things that were fundamental to the human being and psyche.

I can cry at the drop of the pin. But comedy is hard for me; it's the timing.

There have been loads of times I have regretted meeting Paul because I was so happy in my old life.

Comedy is much more difficult than tragedy-and a much better training, I think. It's much easier to make people cry than to make them laugh.

The way to screw up somebody's life is to give them what they want.

Failures have been errors of judgment, not of intent

What makes something tragic is that it could've been averted at multiple points.

I'd love to do a comedic film. I'd love to do a very epic Shakespearian film.

All of our actions have consequences whether we know it or not. We never know what people are going through until something tragic happens - if they don't talk about it.

In many cases, if we knew what it would take, we might have thought twice about it, so it's often wonderful that we don't have hindsight.

Shakespeare is still Shakespeare because story rules.

When we talk about people or a party being on the wrong side of history, it usually requires some hindsight, a position of informed advantage to see clearly missteps that were less clear at the time of events.

The nice thing with Shakespeare from a modern point of view is that a lot of stuff that was tragic for him can read as comic for us.

I love how Shakespeare can really rip your heart out one second and then make you laugh the next. He's a master writer.

Regret's kind of like a fool's game.

The hole I've dug for myself is very big.