Get QuoteDark Inspirational Quotes App

" I had this very strict rule when I began auditioning that I wasn't gonna do a thicker accent, because it was like, 'I can't tell if it's supposed to be funny because he talks funny.' And now I feel like there are certain characters that I could play that could involve doing a thicker accent, as long as it's specific to that character. "

Related Quotes:

" I'd love to be in action movies. I've been trying to convince people. I don't think it's anything physical holding me back. I think it's a general vibe thing that's holding me back. I don't project action confidence, maybe. "

Kumail Nanjiani

Confidence

Love

" A lot of times, it seems like social media has devolved into people just yelling at each other and not really conversing. "

Kumail Nanjiani

People

Just

" I never decided I wanted to be an actor. I just started doing standup because I love standup. Everything else has sort of been these tiny steps leading to this. "

" Honestly, I would love to be friends with Fox Mulder on 'The X-Files.' That's almost a little too obvious, but that would be my answer. I'd love to hang out with him. "

" I was actually looking at the poster for 'Tarzan,' and I was thinking how abs look so different now. These are not your grandma's abs. They go so deep and so sharp now. "

Kumail Nanjiani

Now

Deep

" I moved to New York first and was really apprehensive about moving to L.A., but I really, really like it. "

Kumail Nanjiani

Moving

New

" I started doing standup because of Hugh Grant's best-man speech in 'Four Weddings,' which is basically a standup routine. "

" TV requires a lot more patience. No one's ever like, 'I gotta get up at 5 A.M. and write my stand-up!' It's an easy life. With 'Silicon Valley,' it's long hours and very unglamorous. "

" I loved the Oscars, and I had V.H.S. tapes for the Oscars, and I used to watch them over and over. There was probably one year where I watched it, like, 20 times or something. "

" The world is getting smaller. And people are bumping up against people from different parts of the world with very different points of view. The challenge of our time is going to be, how do you allow other points of view to exist within what you traditionally see as your world? "

" There was one week where I got mistaken for Hasan Minhaj, who is on 'The Daily Show;' Kunal Nayyar, who's on 'Big Bang Theory;' and Karan Soni of 'Ghostbusters.' This was one week. "

" I love, love, love the street-cart food. Gyros are like a meat-flavored fruit roll-up. A meat roll-up. "

Kumail Nanjiani

I Love

Fruit

" You can go slow. Allow your dreams and goals to change, but live an intentional life. "

" I would say I try to make my comedy really personal. I try to tell stories that happened to me, experiences from my life. "

" I don't go, 'It is now time to change Americans' perception of Muslims. It's going to be a long day.' I think you just try to be unique and try to be yourself, and if something good comes of that, then great. "

" I'm from a family of doctors, and I think they really wanted me to be a doctor. I even sort of assumed I would be a doctor. "

Kumail Nanjiani

Family

Doctor

" You really need to have that discipline. It's not even discipline. I just put down these rules. It's not like a vague, 'Motivate yourself!' and do something. It's specific hours set aside every day for certain things. "

" You can get stuck in the trap of reading your YouTube comments all the time. Sometimes I regret it. Not everyone is going to love you. And for some reason, stand-up has this thing where everyone thinks they can do it. So everyone thinks they're an expert. "

" Think about when you were 12 or 13. The stuff I watched was awful! I tried to watch a 'He-Man' cartoon recently, and I was like, 'Oh my God!' I just had, like, a small brain. I was stupid. "

" The worst job I ever had was an office job that I had for six years, and that's nothing against the people who I was surrounded by, because they were wonderful people. "

" It happens to people. People ruin things they love! I'm sure the guy who played Jar Jar Binks loved 'Star Wars.' "

" When I was studying comedy in Chicago, it wasn't long after 9/11. There were a lot Middle Eastern comedians who were doing bits about hailing cabs and being terrorists. So the first two years, I didn't do any of that because I wanted to separate myself from those guys. But race is a big part of who I am, and it should be a big part of my comedy. "

" I still don't have a real appreciation for music because I didn't really start listening to it until my 20s. My wife knows everything about music, and I try and get her to educate me, but it's just not part of my DNA. "

Kumail Nanjiani

Appreciation

Listening

" Living in Pakistan, you didn't have a sense of how huge and varied America was geographically. I had visited once. I thought of it as this crazy, happy, exciting place where everybody's rich, and there's stuff everywhere. Compared to Pakistan, it's not untrue. Compared to Pakistan, the streets are paved with gold. "

" Wikipedia is kind of weird. I feel it's lame to put up my own page, but I desperately want someone else to do it. "

" When generally people make race-based jokes to me - even if they're not technically racist, they're sort of based on me being Pakistani or whatever - on Twitter, you know, I block a lot of people who say something weird about my name or something. It does bug me generally, but it is all about context. "

Kumail Nanjiani

You

Weird

" I always felt that it was never the duty of a person to really stand up for their gender or their race or anything like that - I always felt that was a personal choice. But I do feel now that maybe my opinion is evolving or changing a little bit. "

" Most of my exposure to American pop culture was through this weird prism of 'Mad' magazine. "

" One of my favorite comedies is 'Shaun of the Dead.' "

" Studio execs were like, ''Lord of the Rings!' People want to see sword-and-dragon-type things!' No, people just want to see great stories. Hollywood always takes the wrong lesson from successes. "