“I want people to say at the end of my day, you know, like I used to say about Sidney Poitier and James Cagney and Joan Crawford and Red Skelton and those guys and Bill Cosby. They did quality and substance. You always remember them.”

I’m so black, I leave fingerprints on coal.

I think you can measure how pathetic your life is by how much joy you get from learning about other people’s faults and troubles.

It’s a pleasure to work with someone who is just as strong as you are.

I have Glocks, .45s, Berettas, Remingtons. I like the marksmanship and the discipline that it takes to be a gun owner. I like the machinery. Being able to take it out and clean it is even more fascinating than having the gun.

When I hit my 20s, I struggled to make it. I got married at 19, and my daughter, Je’Niece, was born a year later. I worked blue collar jobs during the day and comedy clubs at night, and I was earning about $25 a year doing stand-up.

Bernie Mac don’t sugarcoat.

I want to speak directly to the audience, to say, ‘I’m like you – I’m frustrated, I’m not an expert, I don’t have a manual on parenting, I make mistakes, I’m selfish too.’

You can’t be a doctor if you don’t know the entire parts of the body.

I know doing movies is where I need to be. That’s where my audience wants to see me.

You know you poor when you eatin’ breakfast food late. You fryin’ toast? At nine o’clock at night? With bacon? You’re broke.

Hugs aren’t like pieces of pie. Plenty of hugs to go around.

My humor had changed from foolishness to making sense.

You’re never going to see me playing a buffoon.

I think a lot of TV insults the audience.

I can act. I’ve been acting for a long time, but like anything else, don’t nobody owe you nothing. You’ve go to pay your dues. You go from A to Z; you don’t go from M to Z.

I was a street performer for two years.

I equate Deadheads to people that like black licorice. There aren’t many people that like black licorice, but the ones that do, REALLY REALLY like it! Or buttermilk, or whatever.

I’m not the same man I used to be, I’m not out hell-raising, stuff like that. I am a changed man.

I like all the kinds of music I’ve been into. I’m certainly not a purist in that I will only play country licks in a country song or blues licks in blues stuff.

The fine, hair-like rootlets at the bottom and the microscopical cells of the leaves at the top.

If you value a man’s regard, strive with him. As to liking, you like your newspaper – and despise it.

If you don’t like what someone has to say, argue with them.

We’re like licorice. Not everybody likes licorice, but the people who like licorice really like licorice.

Like you might love watching basketball, but that don’t mean that you’ll get on the court.