[On John Cleese:] He sometimes seems to swat at his own thoughts as if they were bees.

Prague is like a vertical Venice steps everywhere.

Rosalia is dressed in raven clothes forty years too old for her, so that she seems to be in mourning for her life.

People in a temper often say a lot of silly, terrible things they mean.

A satirist, often in danger himself, has the bravery of knowing that to withhold wit's conjecture is to endanger the species.

Funniness is the wild card in the pack.

The masters of the comic spirit are often our prophets.

jokes are ideally pleasurable. They are an act of assassination without a corpse, a moment of total annihilation that paradoxically makes anything possible.

Black and white are the most ravishing colors of all in film.

[On Watermelon Man:] ... it is impossible to look at this film without its giving you a share in its insane bad taste, which is rather companionable of it.

Great comedy calls large matters into question.

Some people are willing to betray years of friendship just to get a little bit of the spotlight.

In my books, I never portray violence as a reasonable solution to a problem. If the lead characters in the story are driven to it, it's at the extreme end of their experience.

I go snowboarding and scuba diving to get to places of power where I can more correctly perceive the still center of my own mind. I also find that extreme athletics helps to clarify your mind.

The plain working truth is that it is not only good for people to be shocked occasionally, but absolutely necessary to the progress of society that they should be shocked pretty often.

I truly thank whoever's up there for giving me the opportunity to be loved.

No one can do me any good by loving me; I have more love than I need or could do any good with; but people do me good by making me love them - which isn't easy.

A lot of women have trouble with their mothers-in-law.” Raphael’s look was priceless. “My mother is an insane archangel.

We live in an age where in politics, people can't disagree with each other without good faith being questioned, there is always an ulterior motive - in it for the money, advance a career.

I went through the process of auditioning like every other struggling actress in this town.

Nobody in the world is completely dependent on another person, but we are all interdependent.