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By watching the great, old comedians I picked up a few tricks about how to do physical comedy. And whenever I could learn something, I sort of added that to my repertoire.

John Cleese

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John Cleese
Age: 84
Born: 1939
Born: October 27
Actor
Autobiographer
Comedian
Film Actor
Film Director
Film Producer
Screenwriter
Stage Actor
Television Actor
Voice Actor
Writer
Weston-super-Mare
Somerset
John Marwood Cleese
Watching
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Comedy
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More quotes by John Cleese

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As Daniel Levitin writes, our brain is a giant pattern detector. If we read something that coincides with what we already believe we're more likely to give it credence, while the opposite is not true.
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There's something about watching an animal that puts you in contact with where we came from and what we're still a part of.
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I'm struck by how laughter connects you with people. It's almost impossible to maintain any kind of distance or any sense of social hierarchy when you're just howling with laughter. Laughter is a force for democracy.
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If I like chocolate it won't surprise you that I have a few chocolates in my fridge, but if you find out I've got 16 warehouses full of chocolate, you'd think I was insane. All these rich guys are insane, obsessive compulsive twits obsessed with money - money is all they think about - they're all nuts.
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Telling people how to be creative is easy - being creative is difficult.
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I think the problem with people like this is that they are so stupid that they have no idea how stupid they are.
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The World is insane. With tiny spots of sanity, here and there... Not the other way around!
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What is absurd is not the teachings of the founders of religion, it's what followers subsequently make of it.
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If you are leaping a ravine, the moment of takeoff is a bad time for considering alternative strategies... Do it in the 'closed' mode. But the moment the action is over, try to return to the 'open' mode... because in that mode we are the most aware, most receptive, most creative, and therefore at our most intelligent.
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Basil Fawlty was an easy character for me. For some reason, portraying a mean, uptight, incompetent bully comes naturally to me.
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When we hold a World Championship for a particular sport, we invite teams from other countries to play as well.
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Aping urbanity, Oozing with vanity, Plump as a manatee, Faking humanity, Intellectual inanity, Journalistic calamity, Fox Noise insanity, You're a profanity, Hannity.
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I think that the real religion is about the understanding that if we can only still our egos for a few seconds, we might have a chance of experiencing something that is divine in nature.
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I think there are so many activities going on, like mountaineering. You know, you would pay good money not to have to do that, and yet there are people racing out who want to spend their spare time clambering up rocks.
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When you've been doing comedy for forty years, you really do know most of the jokes. And even if you don't know a specific joke, you can pretty much guess what it's going to be.
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Laughter is the best creative medicine.
John Cleese
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My hovercraft is full of eels.
John Cleese
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The one thing I remember about Christmas was that my father used to take me out in a boat about ten miles offshore on Christmas Day, and I used to have to swim back. Extraordinary. It was a ritual. Mind you, that wasn't the hard part. The difficult bit was getting out of the sack.
John Cleese
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Bureaucrats shouldn't be in charge of comedy.
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Loving your neighbour as much as yourself is practically bloody impossible? You might as well have a commandment that states,'Thou shalt fly'.
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