Richard Pryor Quotes

The reason people use a crucifix against vampires is because vampires are allergic to bullshit.

I ain't no movie star, man. I'm a booty star.

I believe the ability to think is blessed. If you can think about a situation, you can deal with it. The big struggle is to keep your head clear enough to think.

A lie is profanity. A lie is the worst thing in the world. Art is the ability to tell the truth.

I'm not addicted to cocaine. I just like the way it smells.

Two things people throughout history have had in common are hatred and humour. I am proud that I have been able to use humour to lessen people's hatred.

Booty is just a ghetto expression, and I'm just a booty star.

All humor is rooted in pain.

I had some great things and I had some bad things. The best and the worst . . . In other words, I had a life.

If I thought about it, I could be bitter, but I don't feel like being bitter. Being bitter makes you immobile, and there's too much that I still want to do.

Now they're calling taking drugs an epidemic - that's cos white folks are doing it.

I went to Zimbabwe. I know how white people feel in America now; relaxed! Cause when I heard the police car I knew they weren't coming after me!

You don't get to be old bein' no fool.

I can't just say the words, do a lot of one-liners. I love each person I play; I have to be that person. I have to do him true.

Everyone carries around his own monsters.

I never met anybody who said when they were a kid, I wanna grow up and be a critic.

I'm slower and some days are better than others, but I'm a fighter.

The black groups that boycott certain films would do better to get the money together to make the films they want to see, or stay in church and leave us to our work.

But for the use of physical punishment by, and fear of their oppressors, animals would never be a part of a circus.

Marriage is really tough because you have to deal with feelings... and lawyers.

There's nothing worse than being an aging young person.

I had to stop drinkin, cuz I got tired of waking up in my car driving ninety.

It's been a struggle for me because I had a chance to be white and refused.

Have you ever noticed how quiet you get when you go in the woods? It's almost like you know that God's there.

Why get killed when you can run ... your ego will heal much faster than a broken jaw.

When you're running down the street on fire, people get out of your way!

There's a lot more hypocrisy than before. Racism has gone back underground.

I see people as the nucleus of a great idea that hasn't come to be yet.

I went through every phone book in Africa, and I didn't find one god damned Pryor!

Who you gonna believe-me or your lying eyes?

I live in racist America and I'm uneducated, yet a lot of people love me and like what I do, and I can make a living from it. You can't do much better than that.

I bought my parents a home before they died, and they got to see that I was going to be all right. They always thought I would go someplace.

I won't talk about what it was like in prison, except to say I'm glad I'm out and that I plan never to go back and to pay my taxes every day.

What I am for is justice for everyone, just like it says in the Constitution.

Most people that you talk to, they's intelligent. Like I said, "Most people."

What I'm saying might be profane, but it's also profound.

Hawaii is the best form of comfort for me. When I die, I want to be cremated, and I want half my ashes spread in the Pacific around the island, the rest on the property.

You have to have lived some life. You've got to have paid some dues.

You work your butt off and somebody says you can't have your record played because it offends them. Tyrants are made of such stuff.

When you ain't got no money, you gotta get an attitude.

I think about dying. I've come to realize we all die alone in one way or another.

I expected Dracula to come jumping out any second. If he did I'd have held up a cross, cause he's allergic to bullshit.

I just don't want to die alone, that's all. That's not too much to ask for, is it It would be nice to have someone care about me, for who I am, not about my wallet.

There's a thin line between to laugh with and to laugh at.

A sold-out house my first night back. Do you have any idea what kinda pressure that is? I could have been at home in my warm bed, playing Nintendo.

I was a loner and never hung out with anyone. I never had any friends.

Someone called all the newspapers in New York and told them I'd died. I've been told by almost everyone it was an ex-wife - I've had a few so it's hard to pinpoint which one - but who knows for sure?

Friends take up time, and I didn't have time.

So after Another You I ran off to my very own piece of paradise, my home in Hana.

Movies are movies, and I don't think any of them are going to hurt the moral fiber of America and all that nonsense.