There’s an old saying in Hollywood: It’s not the length of your film, it’s how you use it.
BEN STILLERI know that I’m better as an actor when I’m working with a good actor. I think anytime you’re working with a better actor, it makes you a better actor.
More Ben Stiller Quotes
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I don’t devalue comedy as compared to drama. Not one bit.
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Jim Carrey, a comic genius, has a harder time overcoming the public’s desire for him to be funny simply because he’s so good at it.
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Maybe forced retirement isn’t necessary after all.
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There’s always an element of fear that you need to work a lot until people get sick and tired of you or finally figure out that you’re a fraud after all!
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It was Mick Jagger’s idea.The other one was Simple Plan, based on a novel by Scott Smith. It’s a great book – really stark, not a comedy – about a guy who finds $4 million in a plane crash and decides to keep it.
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When I didn’t have a family, I was much more of a workaholic. I still like to work, but I also want to be home with them. As you get older, you realize you need balance. If it’s not fun, what’s the point?
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Paul is Starsky, and I met him before shooting. He was very kind and encouraged us to go with what we wanted to do. It was very sweet to see them back with the car after 25 years.
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I know that I’m better as an actor when I’m working with a good actor. I think anytime you’re working with a better actor, it makes you a better actor.
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Whatever talent I had, I’m sure it helped that my parents were in the business and that I grew up around actors, comedians and directors.
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I think you never want to have to go into the scene having to improvise; you want to make sure its working on the page. But I do like to have the ability to try stuff just in the moment, to give it some sort of spontaneity.
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I enjoy the work I do in comedies. It’s a valid test of your creative abilities.
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I have not been an easygoing guy. I think it’s called bipolar manic depression. I’ve got a rich history of that in my family.
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I think most politicians could take a dodgeball in the face.
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Fashion is so over the top.
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It’s what I wanted to do with my life. Not necessarily just direct Jim Carrey movies, but to direct and act and write and create and along the way discover what it is that I’m about.
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I wanted to be funny for people who didn’t care about fashion at all, to just to kind of exist as a silly character.
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Oh, you can milk just about anything with nipples.
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I had two projects that fell apart during preproduction. The first one was this movie that Judd Apatow and I had written about two guys following the Rolling Stones. It was going to be half concert film, half pseudo-documentary.
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I’m Jewish, but my mom’s Catholic, so the guilt area is covered. I have the highest expectations, along with the lowest. I tried to put as much of myself as possible in Reality Bites, but in terms of my humor, I’m still trying to figure out what my sensibility is. It’s a process, really.
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The big-name stars . . . are always going to be playing what they’ve played before if they want to remain so-called A-list stars. That’s why someone like Johnny Depp is doing more interesting roles not caring about the size of the movie.
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There’s a sense here in L.A. that everybody’s aware of everybody all the time. It’s funny but we choose it. People who are here want to be here, including me.
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My own parents were touchy-feely.
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When I was growing up, This is Spinal Tap [1984] was the ultimate comedy, and it was the kind of thing I wanted to do. But you get to a point with parody where you can’t go much further because ultimately it’s feeding off of somebody else’s creativity.
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I’m not an expert on the Malaysian sense of humor.
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And I was like, “Yeah, anything. Twenty-four hours times five is 120 hours. Oh, great, I’ll fill 120 hours of my life with something.” So I did that and it was fun, and then I did Flirting with Disaster.
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I actually started working on Madagascar before my daughter was born.
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