Quotes about audience
page 5

David Puttnam photo
Helen Hayes photo
Peter Greenaway photo
Maynard James Keenan photo
M. Balamuralikrishna photo
Will Rogers photo

“I certainly know that [A] comedian can only last till he either takes himself serious or his audience takes him serious and I don't want either of those to happen to me til I am dead”

Will Rogers (1879–1935) American humorist and entertainer

if then
Daily Telegram #1538, The First Good News of the 1928 Campaign! Mr. Rogers Says He Will Not Run For Anything (28 June 1931) <ref name=telegram3>
Daily telegrams

John McCain photo
Cotton Mather photo
Bill Engvall photo
Rollo May photo
William Peter Blatty photo
Craig Ferguson photo

“"Whaa, I'm Brad Pitt. I'll crush you." [audience laughs] "With my hand!"”

Craig Ferguson (1962) Scottish-born American television host, stand-up comedian, writer, actor, director, author, producer and voice a…

The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson (2005–2014)

Roger Ebert photo
Kathy Griffin photo
James Cagney photo

“You don't psych yourself up for these things, you do them… I'm acting for the audience, not for myself, and I do it as directly as I can.”

James Cagney (1899–1986) American actor and dancer

Cagney by Cagney, his autobiography (1976)

Chris Cornell photo
Merian C. Cooper photo
Ron White photo
Erving Goffman photo
Eduard Hanslick photo

“That the sweetly intoxicating three-four rhythm which took hold of hand & foot, necessarily eclipsed great & serious music & made the audience unfit for any intellectual effort goes without saying.”

Eduard Hanslick (1825–1904) austrian musician and musicologist

Quoted by Long Beach Opera Co. http://www.longbeachopera.org/index.php4?id=200403

William Lane Craig photo

“Hitchens: I've got another question for you, which is this: How many religions in the world do you believe to be false?
Craig: I don't know how many religions in the world there are, so I can’t answer.
Hitchens: Well, could you name... fair enough. I'll see if I can't narrow that down. That was a clumsily asked question, I admit. Do you regard any of the world's religions to be false?
Craig: Excuse me?
Hitchens: Do you regard any of the world's religions to be false preaching?
Craig: Yes, I think—yes, certainly.
Hitchens: Would you name one, then?
Craig: Islam.
Hitchens: That's quite a lot.
Craig: Pardon me?
Hitchens: That's quite a lot.
Craig: Yes.
Hitchens: Do you, therefore—do you think it's moral to preach false religion?
Craig: No.
Hitchens: So religion is responsible for quite a lot of wickedness in the world right there?
Craig: Certainly.
Hitchens: Right.
Craig: I'd be happy to concede (laughs) that. I would agree with that.
Hitchens: So if I was a baby being born in Saudi Arabia today, would you rather it was me or a Wahhabi Muslim?
Craig: Would I be—you rather be what?
Hitchens: Would you rather it was me—it was an atheist baby or a Wahhabi baby?
(Audience and Dr. Craig laugh):
Craig: I-I don't have any preference as to whether you would be... (laughing)
Hitchens: You don’t? As bad as that, O. K. Are there any—I'm sorry. I've only got a few seconds. It's a serious question. I shouldn't squander it. Are there any Christian denominations you regard as false?
Craig: Certainly.
Hitchens: Could I know what they are?
Craig: Well, I am not a Calvinist, for example. I think that certain tenets of Reformed Theology are incorrect. I would be more in the Wesleyan Camp myself. But these are differences among brethren. These are not differences on which we need to put one another in some sort of a cage. So within the Christian camp, there's a large diversity of perspectives. I'm sure there are views that I hold that are probably false, but I'm trying my best to get my theology straight, trying to do the best job. But I think all of us would recognize that none of us agree on every point of Christian doctrine, on every dot and tittle.”

William Lane Craig (1949) American Christian apologist and evangelist

Craig vs Christopher Hitchens debate, Biola University, La Mirada, California, 4th April 2009 http://www.reasonablefaith.org/does-god-exist-craig-vs-hitchens-apr-2009#section_6

Tom Waits photo
Pat Conroy photo

“She shows herself to the audience like the Host to the congregation.”

Kenneth Tynan (1927–1980) English theatre critic and writer

"Marlene Dietrich," p. 217
Profiles (1990)

Lewis Black photo

“[On Las Vegas audiences] Those audiences are wonderful. Talk about the most bitter group of people on the planet Earth! For one brief shining moment, I am Mr. Happy!”

Lewis Black (1948) American stand-up comedian, author, playwright, social critic and actor

Anticipation (2008)

Debito Arudou photo

“Too many Japanese believe that they can say whatever they like in Japanese ('that statement was for a domestic audience' is very often an excuse for gaffes), as though Japanese is some secret code.”

Debito Arudou (1965) Author/activist with Japanese citizenship born in the USA

Debito Arudou on defending the Japanese weeklies, as well as Ryann Connell and his collaborators, by suggesting that the Mainichi Shimbuns now defunct WaiWai column was "an essential guide to Japanese attitudes and editorial directives." Justin Norrie, "Japan rails at Australian's tabloid trash" http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/news/world/japan-rails-at-australians-tabloid-trash/2008/07/04/1214951041660.html?page=2, Brisbane Times (2008-07-05)

Goran Višnjić photo
Julie Andrews photo
Charlie Brooker photo
Tina Fey photo

“If you want to make an audience laugh, you dress a man up like an old lady and push her down the stairs. If you want to make comedy writers laugh, you push an actual old lady down the stairs.”

Tina Fey (1970) American comedian, writer, producer and actress

On Comedy
Source: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2003/11/03/anchor-woman

John McLaughlin photo
Howard S. Becker photo
Helen Keller photo
Sarah Chang photo

“The ultimate high for me is being onstage in front of an audience. Nothing else can compare.”

Sarah Chang (1980) violinist

NEWSWEEK 1999 http://www.jeremycaplan.com/SarahChangInterview.htm

Tom Petty photo
Daniel Tosh photo
Judith Sheindlin photo
Neil Gaiman photo
Larry the Cable Guy photo
Julie Andrews photo
Gloria Estefan photo
Frank Sinatra photo

“You can be the most artistically perfect performer in the world, but an audience is like a broad — if you're indifferent, Endsville.”

Frank Sinatra (1915–1998) American singer and film actor

As quoted in Moment of Grace: The American City in the 1950s (2002) by Michael Johns.

Shreya Ghoshal photo

“An award means a lot to me. It brings happiness along with a kind of fear. It brings fear because the award is the responsibility which audiences have put on us. So a singer winning an award should always try to give best of him to the audiences.”

Shreya Ghoshal (1984) Indian playback singer

Ghoshal's thoughts about winning awards http://www.timesofindia.com/entertainment/hindi/music/news/I-am-not-a-competitive-person-Shreya-Ghoshal/articleshow/18400625.cms

A. R. Rahman photo
Mohammad Reza Pahlavi photo
Lee De Forest photo

“The actual poetry of this engineering triumph was first brought stunningly upon me in 1915 when I sat in an audience in San Francisco and heard the breaking of the surf upon the far Atlantic shore.”

Lee De Forest (1873–1961) American inventor

"Dawn of the Electronic Age" http://blog.modernmechanix.com/2006/03/20/dawn-of-the-electronic-age/, Popular Mechanics, January 1952

“I will be even briefer than Fabian, I thought I would creep in the back and I don’t have to say anything but what I would like to say and I came in when Eddy was 10 speaking and that was because we had a very constructive meeting with the High Commissioner yesterday and we made some decisions which is always good. Where I disagree sometimes with the Greek Cypriots is that I wanted to vote for Turkey never to be in the European Union! I have no interest in Turkey being in the EU until all, a whole host of problems are resolved and it is of course the Cyprus problem for me first on the agenda, but it is the Kurdish problem, its the military backing barracks, and all the rest of that, you know there are no human rights and many human rights violations in Turkey. So whether it takes 20 years or longer that makes me think that Turkey is using Cyprus as a lever to get as much out of it as is possible and of course the longer it takes for them not to be a member the longer that lever takes and the longer we will have 200,000 or 300,000 Turks settled in Cyprus and that becomes a very much bigger problem than it is now already and I think that I have said that at three or four meetings before rather than us talking about the problem of Cyprus which makes that it becomes a problem for the Republic as it is worldwide known we ought to talk about the problem of Turkey, it is really a 100% Turkish problem that they're not acting in the way in which they should be acting and if that’s the case well shove it to them! And I saw about 50 Turkish … [(A Turkish Cypriot member of the audience accused him saying "You are racist!" and returns his comments…. Many interruptions and heckling from the audience, some Greek Cypriots shouted for the Turkish Cypriot to get out if he didn’t like what he was hearing and three or four police officers arrived in the room.)] Well, it has certainly allocated my speech time and I would only say to the gentleman that we have nothing against honest straightforward Turkish Cypriots but Turkey is using the occupied territory to settle Turkish people they don’t necessarily want in Turkey, many are unemployed, that is not racism, that is a set of true facts and I don’t know whether you are a Turkish Cypriot or a Turkish person I have no disrespect for anybody in the world, but I have deep disrespect for the Turkish Government and the Turkish military and that is my last word on that!”

Rudi Vis (1941–2010) British politician

[At the Friends of Cyprus meeting in the Jubilee Room at the House of Commons, 3rd July 2007] (see External links for transcript)

Dave Attell photo
Tyler Perry photo
Sarah Palin photo

“The Administration says then, there are no downsides or upsides to treating terrorists like civilian criminal defendants.But a lot of us would beg to differ. For example, there are questions we would've liked this foreign terrorist to answer before he lawyered up and invoked our US constitutional right to remain silence. Our US constitutional rights. Our rights that you, sir [addressing veteran in audience], fought and were willing to die for to protect in our Constitution. The rights that my son, as an infantryman in the United States Army, is willing to die for. The protections provided — thanks to you, sir! — we're gonna bestow them on a terrorist who hates our Constitution?! And tries to destroy our Constitution and our country. This makes no sense because we have a choice in how we're going to deal with a terrorist — we don't have to go down that road.There are questions that we would have liked answered before he lawyered up, like, "Where exactly were you trained and by whom? You—you're braggin' about all these other terrorists just like you — uh, who are they? When and where will they try to strike next?" The events surrounding the Christmas Day plot reflect the kind of thinking that led to September 11th. That threat — the threat, then, as the U. S. S. Cole was attacked, our embassies were attacked, it was treated like an international crime spree, not like an act of war. We're seeing that mindset again settle into Washington. That scares me, for my children and for your children. Treating this like a mere law enforcement matter places our country at grave risk. Because that's not how radical Islamic extremists are looking at this. They know we're at war. And to win that war, we need a commander-in-chief, not a perfesser of law standing at the lectern!”

Sarah Palin (1964) American politician

National Tea Party Convention keynote speech, Nashville, Tennessee, , quoted in
regarding President Obama
2014

Norman K. Denzin photo
Gertrude Stein photo
GG Allin photo
Paul Schmidt photo
Stephen Colbert photo

“After acting for so many years, do you know who you are anymore? Because actors are liars basically, you lie about who you are to an audience.”

Stephen Colbert (1964) American political satirist, writer, comedian, television host, and actor

Stephen Colbert to Viggo Mortensen, The colbert Report September 18, 2014

Ron White photo
Derren Brown photo
Pete Seeger photo
Michael Haneke photo

“Today's conventional cinema, or mass cinema, doesn't take the receiver seriously as a partner. It sees the audience member as a bank machine, whose only function is to spit out money.”

Michael Haneke (1942) Austrian film director and screenwriter

as interviewed by Richard Porton, "Collective Guilt and Individual Responsibility: An Interview with Michael Haneke," Cineaste, Vol. 31, No. 1 (Winter 2005), pp. 50-51

Seal (musician) photo

“There's nothing better than going out there and performing and making that connection with audiences. Even after all this time I get the biggest buzz from that.”

Seal (musician) (1963) British singer-songwriter

As quoted in "Seal: Still Crazy After All These Years" by Fiona Sturges in The Independent (11 October 2003) http://www.arabnews.com/?page=9&section=0&article=33431&d=11&m=10&y=2003&pix=community.jpg&category=Features

Ellen DeGeneres photo
Joanna MacGregor photo
S. I. Hayakawa photo
Kamal Haasan photo
Klaus Kinski photo

“At first, I felt this thing coming up in myself, just really physically growing in myself and happening, but it was a jungle, so I couldn't distinguish things so much. I knew there were, in myself, the souls of millions of people who lived centuries ago - not just people but animals, plants, the elements, things, even, matter - that all of these exist in me, and I felt this. OK, this pushed and pushed and pushed. OK, that was the beginning… And through the years it became clearer and clearer, this thing; it started to separate itself. I could make it come when I had to concentrate on, let's say, a person I had to become - this thing became stronger. And took more of me. In this moment, I let it do it, because I wanted, I had to be this person. And as I was led to doing it, there was then no way back. And the more I tried to do it, the more I hated it. But there was no way back anymore; it was always going farther and farther and farther. Until one day, when I was walking through the streets of Paris, I started crying, because I could look at a man, a woman, a dog, anything, and receive it, anything, everything; there was no difference between physical and psychological. I felt like I was breaking out, breaking up, receiving everything, every moment, even things I did not see. There is no turning back from this. But this danger is the power you have. It is this same power that lets you hold an audience when you are on a stage. Then it is a concentration, the same concentration that in kung fu is used for the kick that kills or to break a table with your hand. It means that you are sure of the power and that you relinquish yourself to it”

Klaus Kinski (1926–1991) German actor

Playboy interview

Warren Farrell photo
Scott Derrickson photo
Sueton photo

“No one was allowed to leave the theatre during his recitals, however pressing the reason. We read of women in the audience giving birth, and of men being so bored with listening and applauding that they furtively dropped down from the wall at the rear, since the gates were kept barred, or shammed dead and were carried away for burial.”
Cantante eo ne necessaria quidem causa excedere theatro licitum est. Itaque et enixae quaedam in spectaculis dicuntur et multi taedio audendi laudandique clausis oppidorum portis aut furtim desiluisse de muro aut morte simulata funere elati.

Of Nero's public performances in musical competitions.
Source: The Twelve Caesars, Nero, Ch. 23

Peter Greenaway photo
Shahrukh Khan photo

“I take care not to remind my audience that I am Shah Rukh Khan. The better thing to do is to hold a mirror for them and to tell them, ‘This is you.”

Shahrukh Khan (1965) Indian actor, producer and television personality

From interview with Komal Nahta

Waheeda Rehman photo
Pat Carroll (actress) photo
Ron White photo

“To the troops. [Audience cheers as he drinks scotch]”

Ron White (1956) American comedian

Behavioral Problems

Desmond de Silva photo
Archibald Primrose, 5th Earl of Rosebery photo

“Few speeches which have produced an electrical effect on an audience can bear the colorless photography of a printed record.”

Archibald Primrose, 5th Earl of Rosebery (1847–1929) British politician

Life of Pitt (1891), reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

Herman Kahn photo
William Trufant Foster photo
Abbas Kiarostami photo
Richard Strauss photo
John Cleese photo
Rani Mukerji photo
Franz Marc photo

“A musical event in Münich has brought me a great dolt.... an evening of chamber-music by Arnold Schoenberg (Vienna).... the audience behaved loutishly, like school brats, sneezing and clearing their throats, when not tittering and scraping their chairs, so it was hard to follow the music. Can you imagine a music in which tonality (that is, the adherence to any key) is completely suspended? I was constantly reminded of Kandinsky's large composition which also permits no trace of tonality.... and also of Kandinsky's 'jumping spots' in hearing this music [of Schoenberg], which allows each tone sounded to stand on its own (a kind of white canvas between the spots of color). Schönberg proceeds from the principle that the concepts of consonance and dissonance do not exist at all. A so-called dissonance is only a mere remote consonance – an idea which now occupies me constantly while painting..”

Franz Marc (1880–1916) German painter

In a letter to August Macke (14 January 1911); as quoted in August Macke; Franz Marc: Briefwechsel, Cologne 1965; as quoted in Boston Modern - Figurative Expressionism as Alternative Modernism, Judith Bookbinder, University Press of New England, Hanover and England, 2005, p. 35
Franz Marc visited a concert with music of the composer Arnold Schönberg on 11 Jan. 1911 with Wassily Kandinsky, Alexej von Jawlensky, Gabriele Münter and others; they played there compositions of Schönberg he wrote in 1907 and 1909: his second string quartet and the 'Three piano pieces'
1911 - 1914

Gerhard Richter photo
M. S. Subbulakshmi photo

“My greatest fear is giving performances. I feel I am responsible for the audience BUT I am also scared of them.”

M. S. Subbulakshmi (1916–2004) singer,Carnatic vocalist

Quotations by 60 Greatest Indians, Dhirubhai Ambani Institute of Information and Communication Technology http://resourcecentre.daiict.ac.in/eresources/iresources/quotations.html,

Birju Maharaj photo

“Earlier one person would do a sam and the audience ten feet away knew that a new tukda was about to begin but now fifty of us did the same movement with the same precision; the audience even two hundred feet away knew and understood. Yes, we connected to many because we were many presenting one. We simply enlarged ourselves by being many more of us and we engulfed the stage.”

Birju Maharaj (1938) Indian dancer

When he changed over from solo form to group ballet of synchronized action and rhythm thus creating a dynamic impact on the audience in [Raksha Bharadia, Me A Handbook For Life, http://books.google.com/books?id=J3BwcatTTZIC&pg=PT179, 2006, Rupa & Company, 978-81-291-1058-9, 179–]

Sid Vicious photo

“American audiences are just the same as anybody else. Except a bit more boring.”

Sid Vicious (1957–1979) English bassist and vocalist

Reported in Julien Temple, The Filth and the Fury: The Sex Pistols (2000), p. 207.

Grant Morrison photo
Malcolm McDowell photo
Karl Freund photo
Judith Sheindlin photo
Jessica Chastain photo
Guy De Maupassant photo