Carl Reiner quotes
Born
March 20, 1922, The Bronx, New York, U.S.
Died
June 29, 2020.
Occupation
Actor.
Carl Reiner was an American comedian and actor whose career spans 70 years. Reiner was best known as the creator, producer, writer, and actor on The Dick Van Dyke Show.
I’m a charming coward; I fight with words.
– Carl Reiner
Lust is easy. Love is hard. Life is most important.
– Carl Reiner
A lot of people like snow. I find it to be an unnecessary freezing of water.
– Carl Reiner
I only please myself. I figure I’m just one of many people. I’m not that different from anybody else and I don’t have great language – I’m very ordinary.
– Carl Reiner
Comedians are really writers who don’t have pens and pencils about them, but they riff.
– Carl Reiner
I certainly have warm relationships with people, but you choose the people you have those relationships with. There are some people I don’t bother with.
– Carl Reiner
Give yourself an impossible task and solve it – then you’ve got a really good story.
– Carl Reiner
I’m not a believer, I call myself an atheist. It was man who invented God. I once wrote that there are 15 things I know about God, and one is that he is allergic to shellfish. There are far too many commandments and you really only need one: Do not hurt anybody.
– Carl Reiner
When I found out I could write I was shocked! I didn’t know I could write.
– Carl Reiner
When you denigrate people, they have two ways to fight back – with their fists and guns, or their mouths. And mouths are seemingly the easiest way to not get hit back. If people are laughing, they’re not going to hit you.
– Carl Reiner
A fellow who has a funny bone can learn to hone his skills, but I don’t think you can develop a funny bone – you either have it or you don’t. And by the way – when you get it, we don’t know it.
– Carl Reiner
If you can get a laugh out of a name, you’re ahead of the game.
– Carl Reiner
Mel BrooksId like to acknowledge three people who early on knew Mel Brooks was one of the funniest people in the world: Sid Caesar, me, and Mel Brooks.
– Carl Reiner
I’m an entertainer and I entertain people and they entertain me back by asking questions. And some of them I answer.
– Carl Reiner
Improvisation is just writing in front of an audience.
– Carl Reiner
Inviting people to laugh with you while you are laughing at yourself is a good thing to do. You may be a fool but you’re the fool in charge.
– Carl Reiner
It’s like a bird. If he knew what he was doing, he would fall.
– Carl Reiner
An attitude will give you heft.
– Carl Reiner
I am an atheist. I have a very different take on who God is. Man invented God because he needed him. God is us.
– Carl Reiner
Everybody wants to laugh – you know that. They need to laugh… people need to laugh.
– Carl Reiner
You’d only write what you know and what you know is what you do and the people you know. So you’d write about them or the people you have met casually. It’s part of your life.
– Carl Reiner
My father was a watchmaker and an inventor. I saw him working in the house every day. The work ethic, I got from him. He worked hard and he never complained about it.
– Carl Reiner
The absolute truth is the thing that makes people laugh.
– Carl Reiner