“Plays by Alan Ayckbourn have been attracting larger audiences in the regional theatres than those of Shakespeare.”

If you are flattering a woman, it pays to be a little more subtle.

A comedy is just a tragedy interrupted, I once said. Do you finish with the kiss or when she opens her eyes to tell him she loves him and sees blonde hairs on his collar?

What is considered sane in writers is made for the rest of the human race.

The darker the subject, the more light you must try to shed on the matter. And vice versa.

Few women care to be laughed at and men not at all, except for large sums of money.

There is a school of thought that believes that sleep is for the night. You appear to be out to disprove them.

Whatever devices you use should always be there to serve the theme. If the theme has been overtaken by the device, then something’s wrong.

You don’t have to bother with men, they believe any compliment automatically.

Cats names are more for human benefit. They give one a certain degree more confidence that the animal belongs to you.

I think of a plot, I think of an idea, and then I wonder, How can I get that onto the stage?.

So as not to disturb me in my little nook behind the biography shelves.

Custard pie humour is fairly universal, but at the other end, which I’m more interested in, there’s the humour that hovers on the darkness, that walks in the shadow of something else, not always that obvious.

A gentleman … sleeps at his work. That’s what work’s for. Why do you think they have the SILENCE notices in the library?

What I find interesting is how close you can run the laughter along the seam of seriousness, and occasionally cross it, so that half the house genuinely doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

As a writer one is allowed to have conversations with oneself.

He really is terribly heavy going. Like running up hill in roller skates.

Theater is like boxing – having the audience ringside. It’s instant gratification. Or horrification.

If the people in the audience are talking, you’re being ignored. If the people are gazing at you, you’ve got something they want to hear.

There’s music that can affect people in their lives, and they will always relate to the point that they heard it and experienced it, either if you’re playing it or you’re receptive, as an audience.

I don’t think anyone ever gets over the surprise of how differently one audience’s reaction is from another.

I look at an audience kind of like meeting my in-laws for the first time. You want to be yourself, but you still want to be somebody that they like. When I go on the stage each night, I try my best to outguess my audience.

My favorite job is being a father. I have four girls now. They’re a captive audience.

It was great fun. We had gone on tour in between the sessions and reconnected with the audience and got a lot of energy back from them, a lot of positive energy.

I’d love to knock an audience cold with one note, but what do you do for the rest of the evening?