Get QuoteDark Inspirational Quotes App

" I was reading an article in the 'New York Times;' it talked about being in the zone, and being in the zone you're so focused that time ceases to exist. It's when you think, 'Oh, I've been doing this for five hours and didn't even know it.' It's the difference between hard work and going, '12 o'clock, not moving.' "

Steve Martin

Hard Work

Reading

New York

Related Quotes:

" I think there are people out there writing original bluegrass songs, but it's hard to get them out on the air. "

" I was always a huge fan of E. E. Cummings. He did a series of lectures at Harvard or Princeton, and they were recorded. And they were incredibly moving. "

" A record isn't like a movie - you can get it together pretty fast. "

" When I first started doing my comedy act, I just desperately needed material. So I took literally everything I knew how to do on stage with me, which was juggling, magic and banjo and my little comedy routines. I always felt the audience sorta tolerated the serious musical parts while I was doing my comedy. "

" I believe that sex is one of the most beautiful, natural, wholesome things that money can buy. "

" In my banjo show with the Steep Canyon Rangers, I do do comedy during that show. It'd be absurd just to stand there mute and play 25 banjo songs. "

" Theories, for me, are just about freeing your mind. It doesn't mean the theory is going to work like a scientific theory works. It's about freeing your mind and making you think a different way. "

Steve Martin

You

Mind

" Bad psychoanalysis would say I enjoyed pleasing people, working really hard and pleasing people, which is probably related to my father in some way. But I really liked working hard. When I worked at Disneyland, I'd do 12 hours straight and go home thrilled. "

" There's a lot of thought in art. People get to talk about important things. There's a lot of sex, you know, in art. There's a lot of naked women and men, and there's intrigue, there's fakery. It's a real microcosm of the larger world. "

" The thing about the banjo is, when you first hear it, it strikes many people as 'What's that?' There's something very compelling about it to certain people; that's the way I was; that's the way a lot of banjo players and people who love the banjo are. "

" Nothing I do is done by popular demand. "

" I cringe at backstory. Because it never quite explains or gets into some psychological thing that is never quite right and never quite the truth and who knows why someone is some way. "

" I love comedy. That's what got me into the arts. I don't even know how to categorize myself anymore. "

Steve Martin

Myself

Know

" I feel good about being able to take bluegrass on to television like 'Letterman' and 'The View,' and I've heard nice things about being able to do that. I really haven't felt any negativity toward me or my music. "

" I would get records by Earl Scruggs... I would tune my banjo down and I'd pick out the songs note by note. Learned how to play that way. I persevered. There was a book written by Pete Seeger, who showed you some basic strumming and some basic picking... And I kind of worked out my own style of playing. "

" There is one thing I would break up over, and that is if she caught me with another woman. I won't stand for that. "

Steve Martin

Woman

" I believe entertainment can aspire to be art, and can become art, but if you set out to make art you're an idiot. "

" I'm enamored with the art world. Anytime you look at anything that's considered artistic, there's a commercial world around it: the ballet, opera, any kind of music. It can't exist without it. "

" I was very interested in vaudeville. It was the only sort of discipline that was a five-minute act on stage, which is what I really enjoyed and saw myself doing. And I bought books on it. "

" I'm tired of wasting letters when punctuation will do, period. "

" Most comedies are really hard to write, or to watch, because you kind of generally know what's coming. "

" I wish I could do a lot of things different. I'm not going to tell you what they are, but if I had a list of all my films right now, I'd go, 'Okay, I'll cross that one out and cross that one out and cross that one out and cross that one out.' Really. But I've made over 40 films. How can I not have some losers in there? "

" Well, today the Grammys is much much better than the Oscars. I think the differences in the shows are that the Grammys are much wilder. The Oscars is much more people in the industry. And people dress wilder, I think, at the Grammys. "

" I did stand-up comedy for 18 years. Ten of those years were spent learning, four years were spent refining, and four years were spent in wild success. I was seeking comic originality, and fame fell on me as a byproduct. The course was more plodding than heroic. "

Steve Martin

Success

Wild

" Hosting the Oscars is much like making love to a woman. It's something I only get to do when Billy Crystal is out of town. "

Steve Martin

Only

Out

" I loved to make people laugh in high school, and then I found I loved being on stage in front of people. I'm sure that's some kind of ego trip or a way to overcome shyness. I was very kind of shy and reserved, so there's a way to be on stage and be performing and balance your life out. "

" I never thought about success. I always thought about doing the job at hand. My goal was getting through the show that night. "

" I like all kinds of music. I listen to Abigail Washburn, the Punch Brothers, and Marc Johnson, the great clawhammer player. I also listen a lot to Sirius Radio, there's a lot of bluegrass there. "

Steve Martin

Punch

Radio

" I think when I was young, let's call it high school, and even before that, I just loved comedy, and I loved comedians. I grew up watching Laurel and Hardy. That's really a long time ago. I loved Jerry Lewis. I just loved comedians. "

" When I was in college, I was debating to try my hand at show business, or to become a professor. I just thought of the risk of not going into show business and always wondering if I would've had a chance. Because that's where my real heart was. "