Bob Newhart famous quotes

I think you should be a child for as long as you can. I have been successful for 74 years being able to do that. Don't rush into adulthood, it isn't all that much fun.
-- Bob Newhart

#Children #Fun #Successful

Laughter gives us distance. It allows us to step back from an event, deal with it and then move on.
-- Bob Newhart

#Happiness #Moving On #Smile

I don't like country music, but I don't mean to denigrate those who do. And for the people who like country music, denigrate means 'put down'.
-- Bob Newhart

#Music #Country #Mean

I am a minimalist. I like saying the most with the least.
-- Bob Newhart

#Quiet #Introvert #Minimalist

It's getting harder and harder to differentiate between schizophrenics and people talking on a cell phone. It still brings me up short to walk by somebody who appears to be talking to themselves.
-- Bob Newhart

#Phones #Cells #Talking

I'm most proud of the longevity of my marriage, my kids, and my grandchildren. If you don't have that, you really don't have very much.
-- Bob Newhart

#Marriage #Kids #Grandchildren

I was influenced by every comedian I ever saw work. That's the only way you learn how to do it.
-- Bob Newhart

#Comedian #Saws #Way

All I can say about life is, 'Oh God, enjoy it!'
-- Bob Newhart

#Happiness #Life Is #Enjoy

Comedians are never really on vacation because you're always at attention... that antenna is always out there.
-- Bob Newhart

#Vacation #Comedian #Attention

I was never a Certified Public Accountant. I just had a degree in accounting. It would require passing a test, which I would not have been able to do.
-- Bob Newhart

#Inspirational #Funny #Graduation

Funny is funny is funny.
-- Bob Newhart

I don't have a stack of scripts.
-- Bob Newhart

#Scripts

I'm very open to the up-and-comers.
-- Bob Newhart

I've been a very lucky actor.
-- Bob Newhart

#Lucky #Actors

It was a decision to work clean. I just prefer to work that way. I have no problem with comedians who don't work that way. There was a temptation in the early '70s to reconsider. I decided against it.
-- Bob Newhart

#Decision #Temptation #Comedian

I think one reason for a successful marriage is laughter. I think laughter gets you through the rough moments in a marriage.
-- Bob Newhart

#Laughter #Successful #Thinking

The only thing I have never done is a Broadway play. I'm not sure I have the discipline necessary to do a Broadway play. I know it holds a fascination for certain actors.
-- Bob Newhart

#Play #Discipline #Fascination

Don't be silly and don't waste your time.
-- Bob Newhart

#Silly #Waste #Being Silly

I really don't know what makes a comedian. I think it's a family background and environment. Yet if you put the same ingredients in another person, he may never utter a funny line.
-- Bob Newhart

#Thinking #Comedian #Lines

Well, my career choice made a difference because I never would have met my wife, Jenny. I met her through comedian Buddy Hackett. He set us up on a blind date and then we got married.
-- Bob Newhart

#Differences #Careers #Wife

The problem is that we live in an uptight country. Why don't we just laugh at ourselves? We are funny. Gays are funny. Straights are funny. Women are funny. Men are funny. We are all funny, and we all do funny things. Let's laugh about it.
-- Bob Newhart

#Country #Laughter #Gay

Because of the spin-meisters and the focus groups and the way politics is run now. It's run by polls and focus groups. So it's even more true today, I think, than it was some 40 years ago.
-- Bob Newhart

#Running #Thinking #Years

I gave up accounting. I went in for about six months writing ad copy. I was fired from that, and then another guy and I did a kind of poor man's Bob and Ray kind of syndicated radio show. Then I decided to stick it out and see what happened. I'd give it a year, a year became two years, and then two years became three years, and then along came the record album.
-- Bob Newhart

#Writing #Men #Years

I kind of do it in my head, then I'll try pieces of it on stage and if it looks promising, I'll put it together.
-- Bob Newhart

#Trying #Together #Looks

I never had an aversion because I was active in the drama club. If I had that aversion I certainly wouldn't put myself in the position of being on stage. Of course, in the drama club you're hiding behind a character.
-- Bob Newhart

#Drama #Character #Aversion

More and more, as I get older, people come up to me and say, 'Thank you for all the laughter.' And my standard answer is, 'It was my pleasure.' But that's the truth.
-- Bob Newhart

#Laughter #People #Answers

I was not influenced by Jack Benny, and people have remarked on my timing and Jack's timing, but I don't think you can teach timing. It's something you hear in your head.
-- Bob Newhart

#Thinking #People #Timing

I worked in accounting for two and a half years, realized that wasn't what I wanted to do with the rest of my life, and decided I was just going to give comedy a try.
-- Bob Newhart

#Years #Two #Giving

I wasn't much good. When I went into the line on a fake - I would holler 'I don't have it!'
-- Bob Newhart

#Leadership #Sports #Fake

I'm one of those passengers who arrives at the airport five or six hours early so I can throw back a few drinks and muster up the courage to board the plane. Apparently I'm not alone because I've never been in an empty airport bar. I don't care what time you get there. Even at 8:00 a.m. you have to fight your way to the bar. At that hour, everyone drinks Bloody Marys so no one can tell it's booze- at least until they fall off their chair.
-- Bob Newhart

#Fall #Fighting #Airports

Jack Benny was, without a doubt, the bravest comedian I have ever seen work. He wasn't afraid of silence. He would take as long as it took to tell the story.
-- Bob Newhart

#Long #Silence #Doubt

But I really believe that if you have the ability, there is an obligation to make people laugh
-- Bob Newhart

#Believe #People #Laughing

When I started out in 1960, I thought it might possibly last a couple of years. I never expected it to last 42. I take great satisfaction in that longevity.
-- Bob Newhart

#Couple #Years #Might

The first time I got up in front of an audience was terror, abject terror, which continued for another four or five years. There still is, a little bit.
-- Bob Newhart

#Years #Four #Littles

I love portraying the totally indifferent person.
-- Bob Newhart

#Indifferent #Portraying #Persons

The only way to survive is to have a sense of humour.
-- Bob Newhart

#Way #Humour

I think that what comes through in Chicago humor is the affection. Even though youre poking fun at someone or something, theres still an affection for it.
-- Bob Newhart

#Fun #Thinking #Chicago

I've been married forty-five years. I think laughter is the secret.
-- Bob Newhart

#Laughter #Thinking #Years

People with a sense of humor tend to be less egocentric and more realistic in their view of the world and more humble in moments of success and less defeated in times of travail.
-- Bob Newhart

#Humble #Views #People

I've been told to speed up my delivery when I perform. But if I lose the stammer, I'm just another slightly amusing accountant.
-- Bob Newhart

#Speed #Amusing #Delivery

All comedians are, in a way, anarchists. Our job is to make fun of the existing world.
-- Bob Newhart

#Jobs #Fun #Comedian

Well, if you’re a native Chicagoan, you know how dumb he [Dr. Robert Hartley] is. He gets on the Ravenswood El, he goes past his stop on Sheridan Road, he gets off in Evanston, where the El is on the ground, and then he walks back 55 blocks to his apartment. Now, would you want to have that man as a psychologist? A man who misses his stop every day?
-- Bob Newhart

#Block #Past #Men

I think there's a part, just a part of comedians, that is still childlike.
-- Bob Newhart

#Thinking #Comedian #Childlike

I don't know how many sacred cows there are today. I think there's a little confusion between humor and gross passing for humor. That's kind of regrettable.
-- Bob Newhart

#Humor #Thinking #Confusion

When you're going for a joke, you're stuck out there if it doesn't work. There's nowhere to go. You've done the drum role and the cymbal clash and you're out on the end of the plank.
-- Bob Newhart

#Roles #Done #Cymbals

There are a lot of questions I keep asking myself about why I do comedy. I guess I laugh to keep from crying. And I guess if you ever get me crying, I might not stop. This is the way I look at tragedy or else I'll cry.
-- Bob Newhart

#Laughing #Tragedy #Looks

I still feel thirty, except when I try to run.
-- Bob Newhart

#Running #Fun #Trying

This stammer got me a home in Beverly Hills, and I'm not about to screw with it now.
-- Bob Newhart

#Home #Beverly Hills #Hills

Well I was much too practical to presume to have a career in comedy.
-- Bob Newhart

#Careers #Comedy #Wells

You do a clean show and it's over and the audience have enjoyed themselves and you've enjoyed yourself, and you haven't had to resort to shock.
-- Bob Newhart

#Resorts #Shock #Shows