Johnny Vegas Quotes

It's lovely being a parent and being in a strong marriage with somebody who is your best friend.

I think it sort of dawns on you that if you're not gigging constantly you're not actually relevant. You may be relevant to a different part of the media now, to television commissioners and editors, but to a young live-comedy audience you're not, really.

Some comics are in it for what they can get out of it. Others are in it for a love of comedy. I think those that are in it for a genuine love of comedy find each other within the circuit and become friends.

People are always asking, 'Where does Michael Pennington end and Johnny Vegas begin,' and you're going, 'It's not like that: it's blurred right across.'

I'm loath to use my personal life to promote what I do, but at the same time, I don't like a journalist going away with no more than you could get off Wikipedia, where most of it's invented anyway.

I used to attract a lot of feeders. I'd be quite happy to be locked in someone's flat and fed liquidised burgers.

I actually enjoy being heckled; it keeps it interesting, and I think it is a nice feeling for people once they have left the show.

I always feel like an interloper when I do serious drama. It's my own paranoia.

I think if you're at the point where you're popular enough to sell your wedding photos to OK! Magazine then you don't need the money.

We all have days where we can't pronounce things or give it the emotion it deserves.

I sang 'American Pie' a lot in my stage set. It had a knack of uniting an audience in a sing-along. It's a clever song about American history but wrapped in a fantastic tune.

You can sway an audience if you win the women over. The gentlemen will follow 'cause they can be so foolish like that at times, they are easily led.

There's this idea that it has to be made in London. But we've got everything up here, and if you've got comics who are gifted because of where they're from, you shouldn't drag them away from that natural resource.

'Johnny' was a coping mechanism who could take those things which could have ordinarily destroyed me, by tweaking my past and throwing it back out there, getting laughs from things that would have otherwise upset me.

I was loved as a kid; I was raised with more love and emotional support than most folks could wish for ... my memories aged nought to ten ... are all bound up together in a mesh of innocence and fun.

I've been offered all the reality TV shows but have turned them down. If I did it as 'Johnny,' there'd be no jungle left! It was really hard regaining control of myself, so I am reluctant to let 'Johnny' back out of the box.

There is something more spiritual to us than what we are on this earth, but how you access it I'm not sure.

I've always been looking for other people's approval.

I believe that Britain is becoming more class-conscious, and I quake at the very idea of Old Etonians ruling the world again.

You can't be a proper comic unless you've been out on stage and felt the fear.

I use very few muscles at the best of times.

If you write, produce and direct, you own things and see them through to the end.

This autocue was obviously written for someone else and I've been brought in at the last minute.

There have been times I've finished a big job and thought, 'Great, a couple of weeks off.' But then a couple of weeks turns to three weeks and then after a month you're staring at the phone willing it to ring.

Being 'Johnny' was almost like an out of body experience. I thought he was just a character that I'd created and could quite easily step away from, but it was much more difficult than that.

I hate flying, airports and the whole rigmarole - queuing up, security and lost luggage.

I do need to explore my faith, because it has got lost over the years and it has been kind of tainted through experience. But I also know it's enriched my life, my dad being a Catholic.

I've got little ankles and a bit of a belly, so it makes me look rather an egg on legs.

They look outside the windows of their apartment in town and realize they're not living in a terrace anymore. This is a room full of dreamers who like to go to London for a day.

I struggle as a writer, and I'm convinced that if I was at school now, I'd be termed as having ADS. Two minutes and I'm drifting.

I thought I could play the hellraiser and then put 'Johnny Vegas' back in his box. I found popularity through self-destruction. The more you damage yourself, the more people are drawn to you, and that can be quite addictive. It is not a lifestyle you can maintain.

I came from a very loving home, had a happy life with no great aspirations, but going to the seminary changed me. There was a chunk of my childhood missing. Once I'd realised it wasn't for me, I still felt a tremendous pressure to continue for fear of letting everybody down.

Never try to be witty with U.S. airport officials. It's always lost on them and you'll find yourself being put back on the plane.

Health-wise, I couldn't have said what my life expectancy would've been if I'd just carried on doing solid blocks of stand-up.

I always say that the stand-up world is the arena of the unwell, and it is.

I'm getting positive feedback for my acting so we'll see if any other interesting parts come up.

It is easy for me to love myself, but for ladies to do it is another question altogether.

You get people who come to London, sever links with where they come from, and then when they need people, there's nobody there. To feel like you can't go back home would be a horribly sad place to be, as is mistaking fame for genuine love and affection.

I couldn't be 'Johnny' in front of a camera in acting jobs and behind the camera I like to be 'Michael.' With directing, you can't do it by halves. There's a lot of reflection, and I have found that I, as 'Michael,' thrive on it. It's lovely coming home and feeling that stuff from a day's work as myself.

From a certain age, I sort of accepted myself for what I was. And although to other people it was like nothing ever goes right, I had a really nice attitude that I'd inherited from my parents, and especially from my dad.

My agent once said, 'You're not very driven.' And it's true. I'm not the type to ring up and go, 'Get me this part!'

For the greater good, I thought I should be a spiritual leader for people for some reason.

I've got too much respect for stand-ups to call myself one.

The people on the QVC shopping channel convince me that life is worth living. They see the good in everything. People who go to counselling should actually go to a room with a QVC seller for half an hour and let them find the qualities within them. For example, they'd look at me and say, 'To anybody else this looks like a stomach but, actually, his feet never get wet in the rain.

I am a big fan of smelly cheeses but the rest of the family don't seem to be particularly keen on them.

Oh, I'm terrible at travel.

I came back from university thinking I knew all about politics and racism, not knowing my dad had been one of the youngest-serving Labour councillors in the town and had refused to work in South Africa years ago because of the situation there. And he's never mentioned it - you just find out. That's a real man to me. A sleeping lion.

I'd never experienced stress before I did stand-up, and it was a massive shock to my system, this thing of waking up, and the nerves of, 'You're on stage tonight.'

My name is Michael Pennington, and I am not a comic character.

Comedy's so subjective, and if someone comes to watch, doesn't get it, doesn't find it funny, then fine.

My first holiday to San Francisco in 1998-99 was supposed to be a two-week vacation but I ended up staying five weeks and nearly didn't come home.