Patton Oswalt Quotes

You have to always work against what you did before, and even against your taste.

When I've tried to reinvent the wheel, I get bashed for not doing the familiar things.

I wanted to keep exploring... I'm not about to choose a series of movies in which I can use the same bag of tricks and style that I used in the first film.

It's fun to be on the edge. I think you do your best work when you take chances, when you're not safe, when you're not in the middle of the road, at least for me, anyway.

If you're not failing every now and again, it's a sign you're not doing anything very innovative.

I do not like to repeat successes, I like to go on to other things.

When I've worked with established artists, I've naturally been more restricted, but you still have to take risks and push yourself to do something different.

So many cartoonists draw the same year after year. When they find a style, they stick with it. They don't mess with innovation, and they become boring.

Since I was in my early twenties, at ABC, I was always only interested in things that were not already being done.

When I do short films, I try to do something completely out of my comfort zone, out of my element.

Tradition is the great misleader because it's too easy to follow what has already been done - even though you may think you're giving it a kick. I was really trying to invent, instead of merely expressing myself.

You can't reinvent the wheel. I remember when we first started out at 'Late Night,' we were trying to hire directors, and this guy was like, 'I see you behind a glass desk.' I don't. And he's like, 'Yeah, the glass desk.' I go, 'I don't really see me as a glass desk guy.'

You want to stand out and be unique and do something different. I always try to zig when they zag - I guess it's a football term, but it applies to a lot of different areas of life.

There's real peril in trying to repeat yourself, and apply rules that applied to something else to a new project.

Nintendo's philosophy is never to go the easy path; it's always to challenge ourselves and try to do something new.

Don't hold back in your writing. Take risks. Go ahead and tackle that crazy idea that you think will never fly, because that may be the one that makes you stand out from the crowd. Keep pushing the envelope.

I think it's really important whilst you're a young actor to try as many new things as possible... to try and do something you haven't necessarily been seen doing before.

Nobody has yet proven that taking a chance and doing something unique that an audience isn't used to is a bad idea. What the theater lacks is that kind of courage.

You've got to be picky in this business - if you're not, then I don't think you have the option of longevity. You've got to be choosy and try and do something that's outside of the box and dangerous. I love doing stuff that excites me, gives me that adrenalin rush.

You have to keep challenging yourself. I've always tried to do that, and I'm not saying I've always been successful. Maybe I've rewritten the same song; it's inevitable, but I've always been mindful of taking the writing somewhere else. You can't stick in your little comfort zone.

All I know is, I'm trying to do things that are a little different whenever I can.

Every part that I do has to be different from the last part that I did so I don't become a stereotype.

Of course you draw from yourself, but the artistic nourishment you want to get is be versatile, do something different, and I think I got a chance to do that in a lot of different ways.

I'm someone who always wants to do everything differently. If I have a pattern, I'd rather I didn't have a pattern. I want every book to be unpredictable and new. Damn it!

I always want to do - take everything and take it to the next step. I don't want to just keep doing something the same ol' thing. Obviously, I could have wrote 'Mother' 20 times and made tons of money and be playing gigantic arenas and whatever, but that's not really what I want to do.