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When the public starts classifying you as thoughtful, someone given to serious issues, you find yourself declassified as a humorist.

Johnny Carson

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Johnny Carson
Age: 79 †
Born: 1925
Born: October 23
Died: 2005
Died: January 23
Actor
Host
Journalist
Magician
Military Officer
Screenwriter
Stage Actor
Television Presenter
Writer
Corning
Iowa
John William Carson
Carson
The Great Carsoni
Serious
Issues
Public
Given
Classifying
Someone
Humorist
Find
Humorists
Thoughtful
Starts

More quotes by Johnny Carson

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I wouldn't have the slightest interest in running for public office. I'd rather make jokes about politicians than become one of them.
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It's the lack of this kind of open and honest education about sex that causes so many kids to grow up with sexual hang-ups.
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Democracy means that anyone can grow up to be president, and anyone who doesn't grow up can be vice president.
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According to statistics, it's a lot easier to get hit by lightning than to win a Lotto jackpot. The good side: you don't hear from your relatives.
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Happiness is seeing the muscular lifeguard all the girls were admiring leave the beach hand in hand with another muscular lifeguard.
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I loved the towns I grew up in as a boy, and after I became a celebrity, I went back several times. I would have had the time of my life seeing the old places and the old faces again, but the attitude of those same people was, I guess you're so big we bore you now.
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The only issue cash presents you is the independence of not stressing about funds.
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I hated my last boss. He asked, Why are you two hours late? I said, I fell downstairs. He said, That doesn't take two hours.
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I think students ought to have the right to protest, but not to the point of anarchy.
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I demand my right to a private life, just as I respect that right for everybody else.
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The only thing money gives you is the freedom of not worrying about money.
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You become successful, the way I see it, only if you're good enough to deliver what the public enjoys. If you're not, you won't have any audience so the performer really has more to do with his success than the public does.
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An oxymoron? What's that? A moron who studies at Oxford?
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Pie throwing is kind of a lost art, and although it may be a rather rudimentary, burlesque humor, there's something inherently funny about taking a pie in the face, under the right conditions.
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Only lie about the future.
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People will pay more to be entertained than educated.
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When a comic becomes enamored with his own views and foists them off on the public in a polemic way, he loses not only his sense of humor but his value as a humorist.
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How much of the national news that you report to the public each night consists of information you've actually gone out and dug up on your own?
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The Champagne they have stored is getting more valuable every year.
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I feel the one sensible thing you can do is try to live in a way that pleases you. If you don't hurt anybody else, what you do is your own business.
Johnny Carson