What I can't completely understand is most other people's fascination with what the famous among us do with their lips and the rest of their bodies. Why do ordinary people become the target of this curiosity simply by virtue of the fact that other people recognise their names and faces but know almost nothing else about them?
— Alan Alda
When I was about ten years old, I gave my teacher an April Fool's sandwich, which had a dead goldfish in it.
You can't be aware of everything. You'd fall down the stairs if you were aware of every intricate thing involved in going down stairs.
I hated high school. It was a prison.
The one thing I think I've noticed about shows that are supposed to be funny on television is that they've sort of become routinized, so there's an awful lot of mannerisms and joke lines that are sort of there to trigger laughter, rather than give actors a chance to play a moment.
I have a strong preference for being alive.
Why would you give money to somebody whose work you don't understand?
If scientists could communicate more in their own voices - in a familiar tone, with a less specialized vocabulary - would a wide range of people understand them better? Would their work be better understood by the general public, policy-makers, funders, and, even in some cases, other scientists?
Anyone I know who's almost died has come out of it, at least for a while, looking at things differently.
Backstage life is terrific training for an actor, seeing shows from the wings.
The President never intends to get into any kind of war situation. He gets carried away by events.
In 2003, I almost died of an intestinal blockage when I was on a mountain in Chile, filming a segment for 'Scientific American Frontiers.'
I find myself going to places where I really have no business, speaking to these people in a whole other field that I have no extensive knowledge of. But I do it very often because it scares me.
What I always wanted to get seen as was as a good actor, when it was the acting I was doing. When I'm writing, I want to try to be seen as a good writer.
I don't really worry about the size of the part much any more. It's nice to have more time to work on the character, and to have big scenes to play. But if there's something playable there, and if it's interesting to do, then that's nice.
I used to be a Catholic. I left because I object to conversion by concussion. If you don't agree with what they teach, you get clobbered over the head until you do. All that does is change the shape of the head.
You can't get there by bus, only by hard work and risk and by not quite knowing what you're doing. What you'll discover will be wonderful. What you'll discover will be yourself.
My father sang well, and he was a handsome man. When he walked down the street, people sometimes mistook him for Cary Grant and asked for his autograph.
What heartens me is to see '30 Rock' on the air. It makes me laugh from my gut, which I really like to do.
The meaning of life is life.
Whenever I think of how much pleasure I have interviewing scientists, I remember that they're having the real fun in actually being able to do the science.
The hardest thing for me about making movies, and that included 'M*A*S*H' because it was made like a movie, was starting and stopping.
You can watch actors create their illusions, but if you don't see where they get the pigeons from, you don't really know how they're doing it.
I used to not want to die in any way but in my sleep when I was a young man. I'd like to die awake now, if possible, with people around me who love me.
Awards shows mainly publicize the people giving the awards.
All I've ever tried to do is play real people.
You know what my earliest memories are? Going from one burlesque town to another. My father was in burlesque.
I was always interested in figuring things out. I'd do experiments, like combining things I found around the house to see what would happen if I put them together.
Kids are natural scientists.
And I think belief is one of those things that comes to people in their own way. And just because I believe in something doesn't mean I think that you should.
No, I never thought about my image. It interests me that there are people who do, that they seem to be methodical about it.
I've sat looking down into a volcano that could blow at any moment; I've helped catch a shark and several rattlesnakes; I let a tarantula walk across my hand, and I ate rat soup.
Listening is being able to be changed by the other person.
When does she do all this thinking? We're together all the time but she thinks deeply about things and with feeling and she can remember the facts. We've been married 48 years.
I always loved Sid Caesar and all the people on his program.
No matter how big the audience is going to be. I'm interested in doing things that are fun.
What's funny is that you can think you really value your life until you almost lose it.
Blind dates are treacherous. You don't know who this person is. You wonder, 'Should I call my grandma during coffee to get out of this?'
I think it's important for scientists to speak in their own voices and not just be mediated by journalists or others speaking for them.
If scientists can't communicate with the public, with policy makers, with one another, the future is going to be held back. We're not going to have the future that we could have.
Marie Curie is my hero. Few people have accomplished something so rare - changing science. And as hard as that is, she had to do it against the tide of the culture at the time - the prejudice against her as a foreigner, because she was born in Poland and worked in France. And the prejudice against her as a woman.
M*A*S*H' was a collection of people, in front of and behind the cameras, that really clicked.
I made my first stage appearance when I was 6 months old.
Usually, comedy shows only influence other comedy shows. 'M*A*S*H' is one of the few comedies that influenced dramatic shows as well.
I was a child, and my mother was psychotic. She loved me, but I didn't really feel I had a mother. And when you live with somebody who is paranoid and thinks you're trying to kill them all the time, you tend to feel a little betrayed.
I'm greedy for that satisfaction of doing something hard and knowing that, even though I was afraid I couldn't do it, that somehow I can deliver.
As an artist, as an actor, as a writer, you have to use what's personal to you. You have to be personal about your work; otherwise, it doesn't ring true.
Really top-notch directors, I've often worked with them just to see how they work.
Begin challenging your assumptions. Your assumptions are the windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in awhile or the light won't come in.
You wouldn't want to be called a sell-out by selling a product. Selling out was frowned on, whereas now you can major in it at business school.
