Bob Newhart Quotes

I don't think too much about age. Maybe if you're hurting, aching and arthritic, then you think about it a lot. But I don't. ~ Bob Newhart

I don't watch that much television. ~ Bob Newhart

Mark Twain gave us an insight into the life on the Mississippi at the turn of the century. ~ Bob Newhart

The greatest comedian I've ever seen is Jack Benny. He wasn't afraid of the silences. ~ Bob Newhart

If 'The New York Times' says it, it must be true. ~ Bob Newhart

Humor's a weapon if you want to make it one. ~ Bob Newhart

Probably the best advice I ever got in my life was from the head of the accounting department, Mr. Hutchinson, I believe at the Glidden Company in Chicago, and he told me, 'You really aren't cut out for accounting.' ~ Bob Newhart

I was never a Certified Public Accountant ... I just had a degree in accounting. The reason I was never a Certified Public Accountant was because it would require passing a test, which I would not have been able to do. ~ Bob Newhart

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

I found the most difficult thing when you became successful - when I had the record album, it won Album of the Year - that you were cut off from the source of your material. Your material was everyday people, and you were kind of cut off from that, and you had to work at it. ~ Bob Newhart

I don't have a stack of scripts that, when I get home, studios are clamoring, saying, 'Has Bob read ours yet?' ~ Bob Newhart

Every new routine I have ever written and performed probably occurred extemporaneously. Then after you have fleshed it out and tried it out in front of a number of audiences and it works, you put it down on paper. ~ Bob Newhart

I'm closer to Bob Newhart than Rodney Dangerfield. ~ Jim Gaffigan

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

I think everyone probably starts out sounding like someone else, but gradually you develop your own sound. ~ Bob Newhart

I couldn't play off people that I don't personally like. ~ Bob Newhart

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

Cell phones have gotten so small, you can't tell who's a cell phone user and who's a schizophrenic. ~ Bob Newhart

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

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

You're not dead at 85. You're a long way from it. Go out and enjoy. You've earned it. ~ Bob Newhart

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

The only thing I really recommend, if you're starting out in stand-up is to not try to copy anybody else. You can be influenced by people. I was influenced by Steve Martin and Bob Newhart and Woody Allen, but I never tried to be someone else. I always tried to be myself. And the reason people are successful is they're unique. ~ Ellen DeGeneres

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

There's a lot of cynicism. Let's really enjoy Christmas, with all that's going on in the world. ~ Bob Newhart

I think that what comes through in Chicago humor is the affection. Even though you're poking fun at someone or something, there's still an affection for it. ~ Bob Newhart

I've always said people say on a dramatic show, 'I was crying. It was so emotional when he went and grabbed that little girl from a burning building and handed her over to her mother.' In comedy, the best thing you can say is, 'I think it's funny.' ~ Bob Newhart

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

I don't know how doctors pick one specialty over another. Some you can understand. Pediatricians. Or gynecologists delivering babies, bringing a new life into the world, but how does someone want to be a proctologist? How can you fall in love with proctology? ~ Bob Newhart

I love portraying the totally indifferent person. ~ Bob Newhart

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

I've done more than I thought I was ever going to do. I've had a very long and very satisfying career. ~ Bob Newhart

I'm glad you can't talk on your cells while the plane is in the air. That would drive me crazy. ~ Bob Newhart

You never know when you'll come upon something and it's going to be fodder for new material. ~ Bob Newhart

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

I have to warn you, I'm not just some sitcom guy. I'm now an author. ~ Bob Newhart

The schizophrenic has no sense of humor. His world is a constantly daunting, unfriendly place. ~ Bob Newhart

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. ~ Bob Newhart

Growing up, I loved Bill Cosby and Bob Newhart. They are a big reason I'm a storyteller because they are two of the best. ~ Henry Cho

Funny is funny is funny. ~ Bob Newhart

Chuck Lorre and I had been talking about doing one of his shows for a while. I said I'd like to do 'The Big Bang Theory,' because I think it's the best written, most intelligent show on television. ~ Bob Newhart

A collison is what happens when two motorists go after the same pedestrian. ~ Bob Newhart

I'd like to make a motion that we face reality. - BOB NEWHART, FROM THE BOB NEWHART SHOW ~ Melody Beattie

Stand-up is different from television. In stand-up, you've got to be in control. ~ Bob Newhart

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

I know Chuck Lorre personally, and am familiar with his work going back to 'Roseanne' and 'Cybil.' ~ Bob Newhart

I was an accountant in Chicago, and a friend of mine, Ed Gallagher, was in advertising. At 4:30 every day I'd be bored, and I would call him. He'd interview me. ~ Bob Newhart

I've had time off, and it drove me nuts. I was crawling up the wall. ~ Bob Newhart

I think there are still words you can't use in family entertainment that you can use in a sitcom today. ~ Bob Newhart

I made a record album in 1960 and it exploded, and I got all these offers for TV. ~ Bob Newhart

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

I can't remember the last live-action, non-animated Christmas movie. ~ Bob Newhart

I have no intention of retiring; I can't imagine not doing stand-up. That's where I started and where I'll be. ~ Bob Newhart

[On playing another character that was not Dr. Bob Hartley]: I think you're lucky when you realize what you are. Spencer Tracy always played Spencer Tracy. I'm not putting myself into that category, but, to the same extent, the part of me that was Bob Hartley is in my new character, Dick Loudin. If you make fine bone china and you're recognized as the best in the world, you don't suddenly announce you're going to make automobiles. We see it so much in this business. We're so self-destructive. If you really do something well, you should stick to it. ~ Bob Newhart

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

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

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

I loved 'Everybody Loves Raymond' because I like Ray and I thought it was beautifully cast, I thought it was great writing. I thought Patricia Heaton was wonderful. ~ Bob Newhart

I come from a time when people like Bob Newhart and Bill Cosby told stories that were devastatingly funny without being off-color. ~ Bill Engvall

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

With the advent of cell phones, especially with the very small microphone that attach to the cell phone itself, it's getting harder and harder I find, to differentiate between schizophrenics and people talking on a cell phone. ~ Bob Newhart

People are meant to be certain places, and I think I'm meant to be on a sound stage doing situation comedy. ~ Bob Newhart

All I can say about life is "Oh God, enjoy it. ~ Bob Newhart

Sometimes you forget you're famous. You wonder, 'Why is that person staring at me?' ~ Bob Newhart

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

One time I happened to use the word 'denigrate' onstage, and it didn't get any reaction. So as I continued my act, the left side of my brain was fast-forwarding to see if I had any other big words coming up. ~ Bob Newhart

I don't know how to do a show not in front of a live audience. ~ Bob Newhart

No matter what hyenas sound like, they are not actually laughing. ~ Bob Newhart

For some reason, comedians are still children. The social skills somehow never reach us, so we say exactly what we think without weighing the results. ~ Bob Newhart

I have an aversion to laugh tracks - the moment I hear a laugh track, I go to another channel. ~ Bob Newhart

'The Mary Tyler Moore Show' was the best television, the best cast, the best-written television show ever. ~ Bob Newhart

I think there's a little confusion between humor and 'gross' passing for humor. That's kind of regrettable, because they aren't the same thing. ~ Bob Newhart

When I started, I was doing all the good comedians I'd ever seen. Then I developed my own voice. My routines are my natural way of looking at the world. ~ Bob Newhart

I am one of the great wasters of time. I have made it an art form. I can get up at 8 o'clock in the morning, be out of the house by 8:30 and back by 5 P.M., and I'll be going all day long and accomplish absolutely nothing. It's an amazing talent. ~ Bob Newhart

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

I am a firm believer in the notion that what we think upon grows and, by constantly bombarding our lives with thoughts of what's missing, we are simply inviting more of that lack into our existence. In the now famous words of Bob Newhart - "Stop It!". ~ Taite Adams

You should have a value system. You can win if you stick with your value system. ~ Bob Newhart

In today's world, you would call my father mostly unaccessible. I'm not sure that isn't true of most fathers at that time. He went through the Depression. I don't know what that would have done to my psyche. ~ Bob Newhart

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

Dad had a music store, and he'd often bring home comedy albums that I would listen to. I started listening to Bob Newhart and Bill Cosby, and developing taste. They really influenced my style of comedy. ~ Billy Crystal

A guy walks into a psychologist's convention with a banana in his pocket.When asked about the significance of this he says;well,they were all out of grapes. ~ Bob Newhart

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

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

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

I wasn't the class clown. I wasn't that obvious. There would be a circle of guys, and they're watching the class clown. And I'm standing in the back, and I turn to the guy next to me and I say something funny to him, and he starts to laugh. And the guy next to him says, 'What did he say?' ~ Bob Newhart

I don't want to sound like the old guy, but cynicism is a potential danger. It colors our way of looking at the world. ~ Bob Newhart

I'm not what you'd call a Method actor. ~ Bob Newhart

I just don't think most people put myself and Robert Frost in the same category. ~ Bob Newhart

I didn't need the elf outfit to play an elf; I could just play an elf. ~ Bob Newhart

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

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

The first time I heard Richard Pryor, I knew he would be a major force in the world of comedy. ~ Bob Newhart

As an actor, you generally want to see the other actor's face. ~ Bob Newhart

It's kind of hard coming from 'Saturday Night Live,' which is a sketch-driven show, to a movie. ~ Bob Newhart

What you see on stage is pretty much the way I am ... a dry sense of humor. ~ Bob Newhart

One of the first things that you learn as a stand-up is, you're the boss. It's your stage, and don't screw with me because I'll make you look bad, which I had to do, because you wind up with drunks and loud people. ~ Bob Newhart

I don't want to find the secret. I'm afraid all the joy will go out of it if I find the secret. ~ Bob Newhart

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

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

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