“What reaches an audience is honesty. If you’re saying something truthful that’s supposed to be a funny line, it’s going to be funny. And if it’s supposed to be a serious line, it’s going to be serious. But, I don’t think there’s a distinction between how you play drama or comedy, if it’s based in the truth.”

A large part of me is pure nebbish – plain, dull, uninteresting. There’s a more flamboyant part, too. Obviously.

I arrived in Hollywood without having my nose fixed, my teeth capped, or my name changed. That is very gratifying to me.

I also have intense relationships with furniture… probably because we practically had none when I was growing up.

You don’t ask a man, ‘Do you want to be in control [of your job]?’ You assume he wants control. Why would a woman be any different?

Thank God there were a couple of people in my life who said, “Go on, go on – you can do it!

I’ve considered having my nose fixed. But I didn’t trust anyone enough. If I could do it myself with a mirror.

Why am I so famous? What am I doing right? What are the others doing wrong?

I’m not weird, just different from people who aren’t different.

I just don’t want to be hampered by my own limitations.

progress, whatever your definition of it, is not inevitable.

It’s very often the artist who gives a voice to the voiceless by speaking up when no one else will.

The audience is the best judge of anything. They cannot be lied to. Truth brings them closer. A moment that lags – they’re gonna cough.

A human being is only interesting if he’s in contact with himself. I learned you have to trust yourself, be what you are, and do what you ought to do the way you should do it. You have got to discover you, what you do, and trust it.

I don’t enjoy public performances and being up on a stage. I don’t enjoy the glamour. Like tonight, I am up on stage and my feet hurt.

When I was working a lot, I felt guilty as a parent. I couldn’t pick up my son every day from school, bake him cookies and that kind of thing.

One thing’s for sure: now when I look at Funny Girl, I think I was gorgeous. I was too beautiful to play Fanny Brice.