I had a blind date with a dentist — and he told me to come back in six months.
~ Joan Rivers
People say it is not the key to happiness, but I have always figured if you have enough money you can have a key made.
I said, Is there! I told him there is a Mafia school where they teach them math — if Johnny has ten fingers and they cut off two, how many does he have left?
Somehow, some way, every person in the arts has to find an accommodation with disappointment and embarrassment. They are the pollen in the air we breathe.
It gathers emotionally inside you, in a strange way a by-product of struggle, of a willingness to do anything, try anything, expose yourself to anything — staying in motion because sooner or later those ripples will cause change.
Laughing made me feel safe. I was not going to be enveloped by the seediness that coated this world like dust.
When you begin to losing your audience, do not get loud; get quiet, make them find you and come back to you.
I have never learned how to tell somebody something good about myself, that should be a secret they must find out .
I am driven. Being driven is my energy source. It is my fun.…I believe that where there is action, there is movement, and those ripples will eventually produce something positive.
The revelation that personal truth can be the foundation of comedy, that outrageousness can be cleansing and healthy…
The act of creation fascinates me. You can only sit with blank page and wait. You cannot press a button, cannot program it.
Everything comes out of smoke and mist and nothingness, a mystical happening…
Liked was the kiss of death. Loved or hated interested him. At least the performer had aroused emotion.
Maybe that is why in my comedy I try and puncture the hypocrisy all around us, why it is almost a crusade with me to strip life down to what really is true.
…but I think comedy is more aggressive than that. It is a medium for revenge. We can deflate and punish the pomposity and the rejection which hurt us. Comedy is power.
…you either do or do not have a comedy mind, whatever that is, maybe a heightened sense of the ridiculous and the absurdity of life…We are all crazy and crazed.
A man can sleep around, no questions asked, but if a woman makes nineteen or twenty mistakes she's a tramp.
I hate McDonald's. I don't want to order my dinner by yelling into a clown's mouth. If I want my face in a clown's mouth, I'll tongue kiss Glenn Beck.
She doesn't understand the concept of Roman numerals. She thought we just fought in world war eleven.
Looking fifty is great - if you're sixty.
I hate Billings Montana. They have a fashion show at Sears Roebuck - no models. You open a catalog and point.
Thank God we're living in a country where the sky's the limit the stores are open late and thanks to television you can shop in bed.
We Can't Afford to Doubt Ourselves I have become my own version of an optimist. If I can't make it through one door I'll go through another door-or I'll make a door. Something terrific will come no matter how dark the present.
I felt a comedy ego beginning to grow which gave me the courage to begin tentatively looking into myself for material.
With plastic surgery, the general anesthetic is like a black-velvety sleep, and that's what death is - without waking up to someone clapping and going, 'Joan, wake up, it's all over and you're looking pretty'.
Every comedian is furious. Age makes me angry. I'm unhappy at not being able to open packages anymore. I'm angry that libraries have gone. I hate children on planes. I'm very shallow, so they tend to be little things. To be honest, I think I was probably angry the day I was born, you know, about diapers or something.
Comedy is learning to be funny, and you learn to be funny in small rooms with young audiences.
Is Elizabeth Taylor fat? Her favorite food is seconds.
My best birth control now is just to leave the lights on.
I enjoy life when things are happening. I don't care if it's good things or bad things. That means you're alive.
Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, today is God's gift, that's why we call it the present.
Yeah, I read history. But it doesn't make you nice. Hitler read history, too.
Thank God we're living in a country where the sky's the limit, the stores are open late and you can shop in bed thanks to television.
If God wanted us to bend over he'd put diamonds on the floor.
Diets, like clothes, should be tailored to you.
My mother loved entertaining, and I've followed suit, so we have big celebrations for New Year, Passover, Thanksgiving and birthdays.
Trust me, there's not one night a week I'm not in a theater somewhere. I adore theater, and I go out with friends, so I do have some nights off.
The ideal beauty is a fugitive which is never found.
Part of my act is meant to shake you up. It looks like I'm being funny, but I'm reminding you of other things. Life is tough, darling. Life is hard. And we better laugh at everything; otherwise, we're going down the tube.
I hate housework! You make the beds, you do the dishes and six months later you have to start all over again.
