Eddie Izzard Quotes

I'm an Action Transvestite

But the Dutch speak four languages and smoke marijuana.

I'm working on a speed boat at the moment. Much more exciting. It'll really kick ass, give great photographs for the people in Bible.

If you're choking in a restaurant you can just say the magic words, 'Heimlich maneuver,' and all will be well. Trouble is, it's difficult to say 'Heimlich maneuver' when you're choking to death.

My stand-up is quite good now, people say. It's just like a big conversation each time. Every gig is a rehearsal.

I like my coffee hot and strong. Like I like my women: hot and strong ... with a spoon in them.

Cable cars are fun - everyone gets on board and becomes a rhesus monkey.

Scrabble was invented by Nazis to piss off kids with dyslexia.

Drama is a complete meal, vitamins, proteins, carbohydrates. It's a slow burn thing. It's got an arc. Comedy is more like coke.

In the UK a lot of people don't like to try. There's a different cultural thing. Here [in USA] if you try and fail, you get up again and start again and keep going. People respect you for it. Even if you keep failing, they respect the tenacity.

Pagans they were into sex, death, and religion in an interesting night-time telly type of way.

I am two lesbians in a man's body.

Animals in the wild are lean, and I think we should be too.

I wanna live 'til I die, no more, no less.

All humans can do more than they think they can do. So I think we can all actually be more superhuman than we think we can.

There's not much makeup in the army, is there? No. They only have that nighttime look, and that's a bit slapdash, isn't it?

We must have been hunters and gatherers but some of us were just waiters and hopers.

Performance enhancing drugs are banned in the Olympics. OK, we can swing with that. But performance 'debilitating' drugs should not be banned. Smoke a joint and win the 100 metres, fair play for you. That's pretty good. Unless someone's dangling a Mars bar off in the distance.

I wanted to be less well-known in comedy.

If I were Achilles I would put my foot in a f**k off block of concrete!

I just play to progressive audiences. You know, if they're watching Discovery Channel, History Channel, that kind of thing, "Monty Python" have already laid the groundwork. They're known around the world. People like that kind of surrealist, left-field humor, and that's what I do. And "Saturday Night Live," a lot of American humor. "The Simpsons," above all, the weird, left-field humor, which I love. And sardonic. So that's all I'm doing. I find that audience, and they're in every developed country around the world.

Queen Victoria, one of our more frumpy Queen's. They're all frumpy aren't they? Because it's a bad idea when cousin's marry.

Cos people think I'm on drugs and I'm not. I'm really quite ... Just a bit of coffee. When I take drugs I start going, Oh, would you like insurance?

I don't know what it's like in the U.S. but immigrants in the U.K. do the jobs the citizens won't do.

You can't land on the moon and say, Ooh, it's all sticky! It's covered in jam!

Everyone gets cards at the beginning of life. I am transgender, I decided to be honest and tell everyone about it, and that's it.

Father, bless me for I have sinned, I did an original sin ... I poked a badger with a spoon.

Learning that you have stamina is an excellent thing to know. If a project fails, I know I can pick myself up.

If you're a performer, people tend to be quite positive about you or they have no opinion.

In Britain we have a very powerful tabloid culture with celebrities on the front page crying with their make-up smeared and tears, and it's kind of what you'd expect from someone who likes to dress up that way.

Real life is actually a lot of boring things with occasional spikes of interest. Eddie Izzard

You have the American dream! The dream is to be born in a gutter and grow up, and then get all the money in the world and stick it in your ears and go THBBBBBT.

You've got to believe you can be a standup before you can be a standup. You have to believe you can act before you can act. You have to believe you can be an astronaut before you can be an astronaut. You've got to believe.

If you think about determination, if people have a heart and are determined, they can get to that place. But there are a lot of negative people who were enormously determined. All the Nazis were determined. They wanted to murder everyone. Everyone with a bad heart, who doesn't care about people, I wish they hadn't started.

I've learnt that you've got to be really non-apologetic... You've got to say, 'Hi, I'm here, can I have a cup of tea? And one of those biscuits?' If you say that, it's fine. If you go in and say, 'Excuse me, I'm a transvestite, I'll be in the corner, I won't be a problem, I'll face away,' everyone will go, 'Oh-oh, problem case in the corner.' So don't apologise.

And the National Rifle Association says that, "Guns don't kill people, people do," but I think the gun helps, you know? I think it helps. I just think just standing there going, "Bang!"
"That's not going to kill too many people, is it? You'd have to be really dodgy on the heart to have that ...

I don't believe in God. So I'm a non-believer in the non-visible. I'm a believer in us; in humans.

I try to keep performing as much as possible - I just like to. I used to take huge gaps off between gigs, now I just like to do stand-up gigs as much as I can.

So then there was the Greek, Socrates, he was great ... He invented questioning. Before Socrates, no questioning. Everyone sort of went, 'Yeah, I suppose so.

We have two hundred languages in Europe. Two hundred languages! Count them! I know you won't!

Racist people, interestingly, are never as polite as smokers. Have you noticed that? Smokers always go, Do you mind if I smoke? Oh, you do? Okay, I'll go outside and have a cigarette.

For me to put a look together, if it's going to be a boy look or a girl look or whatever, is quite a tricky thing to do. I'm not doing drag because drag is seen in a certain way and my comedy has got zero to do with what I'm wearing. I could wear an elephant suit and say the same thing.

America is the new Roman Empire. Remember what happened to Rome.

Squirrels always eat nuts with two hands, always two hands, "arararar", and occasionally, they stop and go, oh, uh, ah, as if they're going, "Did I leave the gas on? No! I'm, no I'm a fucking squirrel!" And occasionally they go, "Fucking nuts! Fed up with them always. I long for a grapefruit.

But puberty was ... well, before puberty, at school, I didn't tell kids I was a transvestite 'cause I thought they might kill me with sticks, you know?

They say that 'Guns don't kill people, people kill people.' Well I think the gun helps. If you just stood there and yelled BANG, I don't think you'd kill too many people.

I think I'm actually a mainstream, popcorn-eating kid. I've always been that, so I'd sit there watching action movies and American moves before I watch other movies quite often because I am that kid. But I've pushed into the more alternative area because that's where it gets really interesting creatively.

MAC gave me 55 lipsticks to test. These are the same lipsticks I got caught stealing by the police when I was 15. How ironic.

I'd be happy to be taken as a woman - and that's what I was initially trying to do when I started throwing on dresses and stuff. But that wasn't going to happen because everyone kept calling me sir. So I thought I'd change the method and just start wearing what I wanted to wear.

My sexuality is straight transvestite or male lesbian. It seems we are beyond the idea that I am gay and hiding it. If I had to describe how I feel in my head, I'd say I'm a complete boy plus half a girl. I don't seem to have the sixth sense that women have or their stronger senses of taste and smell. Gay men can also have it but straight men don't.

Never put a sock in a toaster.

And the druids, they were into sex and death in an interesting night-time telly sort of way.

If there were a god, don't you think he would have flicked Hitler's head off?

I don't believe in God. I believe gods and devils are within us. It's our own battle. Our life's battle is to appeal to the gods within us, and to fight the devils within us.

Danger could be my middle name ... But it's John.

I grew up in Europe, where the history comes from.

You know, I don't believe that religions are religions. No, I believe they are philosophies with some good ideas and some fuckin' weird ones.

I appreciate your applause, but I don't do it for applause. I do it for cash, it's much better.

Your eyes flashed fire into my soul. I immediately read the words of Dostoyevsky and Karl Marx, and in the words of Albert Schweitzer, I FANCY YOU!

Comedy is a great weapon of attack. It's not a great weapon of support.

In stand-up it really helps to play yourself and talk about your own feelings. You cannot fail to be original if you're just talking about what you think about X, Y and Z. Unless you've got a twin brother who's also a stand-up.

When you're more mature, you do start telling the truth, in odd situations. 'I'm sorry, I've broken a glass here. Is that expensive? I'll pay for it. I'm sorry.' And you do that so that people in the room might go, 'What a strong personality that person has. I like to have sex with people with strong personalities.'

If you get anything creative going, then the work and play thing is the same thing, I feel.

People still talk about a British sense of humour, or French slapstick or how the Germans have no sense of humour - and it's just rubbish. I do strongly feel that we are all the bloody same.

I'm an action transvestite really, so it's running, jumping, climbing trees putting on make-up when you're up there!

If there is a God, his plan is very similar to someone not having a plan.

If you've never seen an elephant ski, you've never been on acid.

The Pope is guarded by the Swiss guard who stand proudly in pajamas and silly hats.

I don't believe that competitions are important.

This is your captain speaking. Welcome aboard flight ... one, from ... here to there. We'll be cruising at a height of ten feet, going up to twelve and a half feet if we see anything big. And our copilot today is a flask of coffee.

How to survive boarding school. Do not express emotion, do not feel emotion, do not have emotion. If someone hits you, hit them back, if someone argues with you, argue back, never give in an inch, never look vulnerable and you will survive.

What was the first cat that talked a human into putting a cat door in?

The twenty-first century is a key century for us on this planet. Either we make a world, where all seven billion people have a fair chance in this century - or forget it. If we can't do this, I don't think we are going to make it as a species. Despair is the fuel of terrorism, and hope is the fuel of civilization, so we have to put more hope into the world than despair. Hatred and separation and building walls is not the way to progress. Going backward is not the way to go forward.

The Death Star is just full of British actors opening doors and going,Oh ... I ... oh ... What is it Lieutenant Sebastian? It's just the Rebels, sir ... they're here. My God, man! Do they want tea? No, I think they're after something a bit more than that, sir. I don't know what it is, but they've brought a flag. Damn, that's dash cunning of them.

When you're coming out, you have to deal with the whole world saying 'Oh! You're an abominable snowman'.

"I've done your dog. It's got nine eyes down the side, I made his head all square, 15 legs. What do you think of that?" "Fido looks a bit weird."

Horseshoes are lucky. Horses have four bits of lucky nailed to their feet. They should be the luckiest animals in the world. They should rule the country. They should win all their horse races, at least. 'In the fifth race today, every single horse was first equal ... one horse threw a shoe came in third ... the duck was ninth ... and five ran.'

Religion and philosophy, philosophy and religion - they're two words which are both ... different. In spelling.

You're gay, you sell books ... you probably shag the books.

We stole countries with the cunning use of flags. Just sail around the world and stick a flag in. "I claim India for Britain!" They're going "You can't claim us, we live here! Five hundred million of us!" "Do you have a flag ... ? "No ... " "Well, if you don't have a flag, then you can't have a country. Those are the rules ... that I just made up!

The National Rifle Association says, 'Guns don't kill people. People do'. But I think the gun helps.

Some people are widely read. I'm thinly read.

Before birds get sucked into jet engines, do they ever think, Is that Rod Stewart in first class?

Charles Darwin wrote a famous book in 18 gibberish. And that book was an interesting book, cuz it was called "Monkey-Monkey-Monkey-Monkey-Monkey-Monkey-You"

I did bronze survival swimming. I could save people in a bronzey kind of way.

Cause if you're a transvestite, you're actually a male tomboy, that's where the sexuality is. Yeah, it's not drag queen, no; gay men have got that covered. This is male tomboy, and people do get that mixed up, they put transvestite there - no no no no! Little bit of a crowbar separation, thank you! And gay men, I think, would agree. It's male lesbian, that's really where it is, ok? Because ... it's true! 'Cause most transvestites fancy girls, fancy women. So that's where it is.

Could adults actually deal with a weird monster under their bed? I think if the monster started moving around, then- well we'd get out of bed and we'd get a frying pan, and then we'd beat the crap out of the monster under the bed. Or we'd get a broom and poke the monster out. No, we'd lock the door and set fire to the house.

No matter how much makeup I wore, people just kept saying "Yes, sir! Would you like tea with that, sir?" "Yes, I would like tea. Why don't you put it on my breasts?" "Certainly. Tea for this man's breasts! Anything else, sir?"

I mean, sometimes ... a comedian becomes an actor, and they just don't deliver, because the bottom line of comedy is to be funny, and the bottom line of acting is to be truthful, and they get that mixed up sometimes, or don't even notice that that's the thing.

I felt audiences are happier to take comedy people who play darker people because there's a link between the psychosis of comedy and the psychosis of being a twisted character.

I'm quite good at taking in information so I voraciously inhale Wikipedia - which may have some things wrong in it, but I think is generally more information than we had before. Last tour we didn't have Wikipedia. And then Discovery Channel and History Channel. I can take it in and retain what I think are the most important facts.

It's my manifest destiny to wear a skirt in all countries.

When I was seven, I said, "I want to act." When I was 10, I realized that films exist, and I wanted to be in them. Not a comedian, I wanted to be a dramatic actor. Films just seemed such fun, and like such a great thing to do.

They tend to come out a colour called 'Pants left in wash'

Because we all know one of the main factors of war is the element of surprise. And what could be more surprising than the First Batallion Transvestite Brigade? Airborne Wing.

I had the luxury of knowing what I wanted to do. So I just sat on the bed and came up with a plan for myself:
"I have to go to the Edinburgh Fringe. But I don't have the confidence to do a production there because I've never gone before, and I don't even know how to get there or what to do once I get there. So I will just act as if I do have the confidence to go to the Edinburgh Fringe. I'll just borrow confidence from a future version of myself. Once I've been to the Edinburgh Fringe and performed a show there, then I will have the confidence to go to the Edinburgh Fringe. I will go to the bank manager of confidence (in some part of my brain) and I will borrow that confidence from the future, and then I can wear it like a cloak, and I will talk to everyone with this confidence."
It was out there as a concept, but it worked.

I'd like to have sex with myself.

They say the Universe started with a big bang. I hope everybody stood well back.

There's two positions in snowboarding. One is looking cool and the other is DEAD!

We need to become more open minded to the idea that many of us exist on a spectrum - a continuum - of gender. That for some of us the choice isn't just one or the other - completely male or completely female - but often a combination of both. In fact, it seems there are three different lines on the sexuality spectrum: how you self identify, who you're attracted to, and what you look like. And it seems the dial can be at any place on any of those three lines.