Bob Odenkirk > Quotes

“If you’re ever feeling poorly about yourself, about your lack of achievement, your utter inconsequentiality, your ridiculous little life lived in the shadows—take a moment and write some Internet reviews of other people’s work.”
― Bob Odenkirk, A Load of Hooey

“Jesus Christ went by the name Jesus and was only called “Geez” by his closest friends.”
― Bob Odenkirk, A Load of Hooey

“If I had my life to live over again, I would focus on the getting and eating of ice cream.”
― Bob Odenkirk, A Load of Hooey

“OTHER BOOKS BY THIS AUTHOR SO YOU WANT TO WRITE A BOOK? In this masterpiece of the how-to genre, Bob Odenkirk asks his readers questions such as You want to write a book? Really? Why? Wasn’t this one good enough for you? What about the other twenty billion books you can pick up for free at the library? Oh, I get it, none of them contain your life story. Are you sure? Have you checked? Double-check.”
― Bob Odenkirk, A Load of Hooey

“Whenever someone says, I love writing,' I always think, 'You probably suck at writing.”
― Bob Odenkirk

“I tried just as hard at the stuff that didn't work as I did at the stuff that worked.”
― Bob Odenkirk, Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama

“Victoria Jackson would have been a riot on The Tonight Show in the fifties…the 1850s! Gooooood-night!!”
― Bob Odenkirk, Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama

“I told Chris [Farley] and the writers, "Look. Whatever you do, the one thing to remember is: don't start from the ending [of the "van down by the river" sketch]. Start from the beginning, so that you have somewhere to go." Almost every time Chris did that sketch after I left SNL, he started by breaking the table.

I just became one of those dangerous examples of becoming addicted to the big laugh. You become addicted as a performer to that big moment, and you ask yourself, Why am I not just doing my big thing that gets the big reaction? Why am I not just standing up there and doing that?”
― Bob Odenkirk

“I told Chris [Farley] and the writers, "Look. Whatever you do, the one thing to remember is: don't start from the ending [of the "van down by the river" sketch]. Start from the beginning, so that you have somewhere to go." Almost every time Chris did that sketch after I left SNL, he started by breaking the table.

It just became one of those dangerous examples of becoming addicted to the big laugh. You become addicted as a performer to that big moment, and you ask yourself, Why am I not just doing my big thing that gets the big reaction? Why am I not just standing up there and doing that?”
― Bob Odenkirk

“He laughed aloud, right in my face, at the notion. Here I was, having been farted upon and laughed at all in the space of a few seconds. I felt smaller than a raisin—a small raisin.”
― Bob Odenkirk, A Load of Hooey

“If you can dream it, you can do it. Not ‘you.’ I mean ‘me.’ I was talking to myself. Did you hear me just now? Forget I said that.” —Walt Disney”
― Bob Odenkirk, A Load of Hooey

“TV has gone down the craphole…and NO, that was NOT the third point.”
― Bob Odenkirk, A Load of Hooey

“Then you’ve got the guys who watch the guards and the guys who watch the guys who watch the guards.”
― Bob Odenkirk, A Load of Hooey

“Scientist Welsh is holding some soil in his hand, pours it into a container. The ＥＸＥＣＵＴＩＶＥＳ burst in.

ＴＯＤＤ
Dr. Welsh, these cave-ins are getting worse.

ＪＡＮＥ
Can't we put something in the holes, to fill it in?

ＤＲ．  ＷＡＬＳＨ
Yes, yes. The best thing I can devise is this foam. It hardens, and can support as much weight as dirt.

ＴＯＤＤ
Oh. Great.


They seem relieved. Then…


ＲＯＮ
Why don't we just build our new planet out of that foam?

ＤＲ．  ＷＡＬＳＨ
Well it's poisonous.


No reaction.


ＲＯＮ
Also it costs more than dirt.

ＡＬＬ
Ahhhh.


BEAT.

ＲＯＮ
What's the main ingredient?

ＤＲ．  ＷＡＬＳＨ
Poison foam.”
― Bob Odenkirk, Hollywood Said No!: Orphaned Film Scripts, Bastard Scenes, and Abandoned Darlings from the Creators of Mr. Show

“story around”
― Bob Odenkirk, Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama

“You seem like a nice person, but, seriously, read books more carefully next time.”
― Bob Odenkirk, Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama

“That’s what acting is!”—lose yourself in the part, bring an entire world with you onto the stage. Inhabit that imagined world fully and the audience will join you there.”
― Bob Odenkirk, Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama

“Have you seen the glass pyramid? I bet you’d hate to have to clean that! Trust me, you would, I’ve spoken to the people who have to clean it and they hate it. Guess how much Windex it takes to wash all of them windows? Tons. Two-point-two tons per year. We weighed it. Speaking”
― Bob Odenkirk, A Load of Hooey

“Whenever someone says, 'I love writing,' I always think, 'You probably suck at writing.”
― Bob Odenkirk

“I THINK I JUST MET GOD I”
― Bob Odenkirk, A Load of Hooey

“One trick for surviving Hollywood’s beatdown is to keep making new things in spite of every “no.” To somehow stay in touch with the joy that brought you into the game.”
― Bob Odenkirk, Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama

“When you get to the end of the gallery, turn right—or left, whichever way you want, it doesn’t matter—and”
― Bob Odenkirk, A Load of Hooey

“UPON MY DEATH, at my wake, if you’re going to have a small coffee-service area, somebody put a bowl of BRUSSELS SPROUTS out AS A SNACK…that’ll show everyone.”
― Bob Odenkirk

“The Kids in the Hall were doing everything pretty much right in my book. Their show hung together, was distinctive, really likable, and you got to know them even while they were playing stridently strange characters. Plus they had a number of homes for the show, all in off-brand time slots and locales—right where it belonged. This made me envious and mad. Not at the guys—I liked them all—but at Canada in general. Somehow they were able to bring Canadian niceness to the brain-warping comic mayhem. How much maple syrup do I have to drink to become that nonthreatening? There isn’t enough in the world.”
― Bob Odenkirk, Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama

“Python was like my Bible, and in many ways it provoked contemplation just like that ratty old book. Also, it was kinder and more truthful.”
― Bob Odenkirk, Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama

“OBIT FOR THE CREATOR OF MAD LIBS On Tuesday, in Canton, Connecticut, a town famous for the stickiness of its boogers, a stinky old man died of a good disease at his home at 345 Rotten Lane. Mr. Preston Wirtz, whose parents, Ida and Goober, ran a small jelly farm, died in his yellowish toilet. Mr. Wirtz was hated in Uzbekistan for the series of wordplay books he created for slippery children, books known far and wide as “Mad Libs,” beloved by hairy grumps and farty grampas alike. These books were never appreciated by tall elves, selling over two per year for one decade. When asked to describe Mr. Wirtz, his jealous wife, wearing nothing but an egg carton and flip-flops, called him “in a nutshell, the most sour-smelling, bacon-licking, pimple-footed crab-apple I have ever known. I will never always miss him and his broken underwear.” Then she cried herself to sleep in her fart-house.”
― Bob Odenkirk, A Load of Hooey

“The eyes in your hearts are hopeful! Hopeful eyes that fly with wings! Blind to hatred, blind to retribution. Blind eyes that fly! Think about that! Boy oh boy oh boy, that’s something, isn’t it?”
― Bob Odenkirk, A Load of Hooey

“you’ll see that most of the halls are lit by natural sunlight streaming through skylights. Nice, right? However, that doesn’t mean this joint doesn’t use up frickin’ light bulbs by the case.”
― Bob Odenkirk, A Load of Hooey

“I rarely paid for the inky blather, but the mechanics of Mad are good circuitry to burn into any future comedy writer’s brain.”
― Bob Odenkirk, Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama

“ＤＯＮ
…send the ambassador to Cuba, and firmly remind them that democracy is America's number one export.”
― Bob Odenkirk, Hollywood Said No!: Orphaned Film Scripts, Bastard Scenes, and Abandoned Darlings from the Creators of Mr. Show