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.
BEN STILLERWhen 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.
More Ben Stiller Quotes
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A eugoogoolizer…one who speaks at funerals…Or did you think I was too stupid to know what a eugoogooly was?
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I’d love to travel more. I really look forward to traveling with my kids. I’m just waiting for them to want to travel with me.
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I think this whole celebrity world is weird anyway. Weird and funny and kind of pathetic and yet so right for parody.
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Very quickly after meeting Dustin, the whole image I had of him was shattered.
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I grew up wanting to make movies, and along the way I suddenly found that I had a career doing comedy.
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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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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 don’t have a burning desire to be taken seriously as an actor. I don’t have a master plan in that way.
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Words can only hurt you if you try to read them. Don’t play their game!
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I’m always willing to endure humiliation on behalf of my characters.
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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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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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My parents used to throw great New Year’s Eve parties. They invited such an eclectic mix of showbiz people. All those cool people were always hanging out at our apartment.
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When we were visiting New York City, I took my kids to the same playground where I went growing up. It was fun to feel that connection of having gone there as a kid and being there as a parent.
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Fashion is so over the top.
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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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I think people will be curious to see what I can do as a dramatic actor.
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You’re freaked out that you’re going to be having a child, and once you’re looking after your daughter, it’s the most beautiful thing in the world.
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I’m pretty sure there’s a lot more to life than being really, really, ridiculously good looking. And I plan on finding out what that is.
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I actually started working on Madagascar before my daughter was born.
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Sometimes I wondered whether I hadn’t let my career get confined to one direction, but lately I’ve decided to accept the fact that I have this opportunity to be successful doing comedies.
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I would like to do more dramas when I find a good role that will allow me to politely upset people’s expectations of me as a comic actor.
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I was staying on [writer/director/actor] Eric Schaeffer’s couch in New York, and he said, “I’ve got this movie [If Lucy Fell]. Can you do five days on it?”
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I love New York. I was sad, depressed and incredibly moved by our fellow countrymen and what they’ve done. I wanted to give people a chance to see something funny, have a distraction.
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It was a mixed blessing to have famous parents. It was tough to go to auditions and be bad, since I couldn’t be anonymous.
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My own parents were touchy-feely.
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