There was never any point in my life when I wasn't called Mr. Donen. I'm told my first words were, 'Call me Mr. Donen.' But I suspect that's apocryphal. My mother, Mrs. Donen, tended to exaggerate.
Don't tell your kids you had an easy birth or they won't respect you. For years I used to wake up my daughter and say, 'Melissa you ripped me to shreds. Now go back to sleep.'.
Some kids get called "bundles of joy" or "slices of heaven" or "dreams come true." We got "the fifty-fourth generation of DNA experiments." Doesn't have the same warm and fuzzy feel. But maybe I'm oversensitive.
I always joked with my parents. I told them, 'If I don't make it as an actor, my fallback is musician.'
There was just a lot of comedy on the TV in the house, and my parents are both very funny.
Life Among the Savages is a disrespectful memoir of my children.
My wife is so analytical with raising kids, and I am not. My feeling is if they turn out good, then that means I was a good daddy and put a lot of effort into it. If they turn out bad, it means they took after her side of the family.
I was the world's ugliest baby. I have photos of my folks leaving the hospital with sacks over their heads... I asked my mother how to turn off the electric fan. She said 'Grab the blade!
[On accepting travel suggestions from her two daughters, 6 and 3:] When they pay for the vacation, they get to dictate where we go.
Some men go a lifetime and never have their kid blow up a car, but I have a daughter who's knocked off three cars and burned down a funeral home. Maybe that's some kind of record.
Here’s a bumper sticker I’d like to see: “We are the proud parents of a child who’s self-esteem is sufficient that he doesn’t need us promoting his minor scholastic achievements on the back of our car."
Obviously, I'm going to be embarrassing to the kid. There's just no way not. I just hope the kid has a really good sense of humor... My husband's very serious - he doesn't find me funny at all - so I'm hoping the kid is like, 'Mom is hilarious!' That'd be really great.
So my mum bought a jacuzzi, and I was in there along with my father and my sister, when my mother decided it would be the ideal moment to say - 'Guess what everyone in this jacuzzi has in common? You've all sucked on my tits.'
My tastes in music tend to favor anything my kids don't like, out of natural antipathy amplified by a sort of malicious glee.
I remember watching 'Three's Company' with my parents, and it was time for bed, so I started to make my voice lower like Don Knotts and imitating him. They started laughing, and I didn't have to go to bed, so that informed a lot.
My mom is very good at being passive-aggressive, and my Dad is a total wiseass, so I think the mixture of the two of them is my comedy. But, I am definitely the first comedian in my family.
I get my sense of humor from my parents. That's why they don't have one anymore.
Two Navy SEALs versus one angry seven-month-old," he mused, "The odds could go either way.
My husband is so cheap. On Christmas Eve, he fires one shot and tells the kids Santa committed suicide.
I was so ugly my parents had to hang a pork chop around my neck to get the dog to play with me.
My dad told me that when I was born my cheeks were so fat the doctors didn't know which end to spank.
When I was little, I thought about becoming a lawyer like my parents, and my mother would always tell me, "You can do anything you want - except be a lawyer."
My parents are cartoons. When they come up and visit, they're hilarious. My mother somehow finds a way to get in the way of everything.
I was three. My father in jest said that he'd tell the doctor to give me a shot if I didn't behave. Good heavens, I have a mental picture of the living room and the doctor approaching the door. I was terrified.
People always ask about my dad and his comedic influence. It's funny because my mom is really the comedian of our household.
