Larry David Quotations

Trying on pants is one of the most humiliating things a man can suffer that doesn't involve a woman.

It has to do - I think - with growing up in an apartment, with my aunt and my cousins right next door to me, with the door open, with neighbors walking in and out, with people yelling at each other all the time.

I was planning on my future as a homeless person. I had a really good spot picked out.

When you're not concerned with succeeding, you can work with complete freedom.

Anyone can be confident with a full head of hair. But a confident bald man - there's your diamond in the rough.

If you tell the truth about how you're feeling, it becomes funny.

I've led this empty life for over forty years and now I can pass that heritage on and ensure that the misery will continue for at least one more generation.

I don't think anyone really is interested in reading about my emotional state. It's not even interesting to me.

When I was living in New York and didn't have a penny to my name, I would walk around the streets and occasionally I would see an alcove or something. And I'd think, that'll be good, that'll be a good spot for me when I'm homeless.

Sure, being a reservist wasn't as glamorous, but I was the one who had to look at myself in the mirror.

I just wanted laughs - that's really what I was after.

Every relationship is just so tenuous and precarious.

And eventually as I kept writing it, something emerged that was not quite me but a version of me.

At first, I didn't realize it was gonna be a character. I just thought I was gonna be doing me.

I just feed off the energy of the audience.

Most of the time I'm thinking, I'm glad that scene was improvised.

Until I started doing standup, there were some very bleak days.

There's a sense of spontaneity, and no emphasis on jokes in this show. People generally talk the way they talk in life if you were in this particular situation.

Even back then, I exuded self-confidence, and that drives women crazy.

Even though the National Guard and Army Reserve see combat today, it rankles me that people assume it was some kind of waltz in the park back then.

I think that for the most part, when I started doing comedy, it had become very commercialized.

It's that I wasn't suited to do the kind of comedy that these people were coming to hear - mainstream comedy.

The only change I can really see is that I don't have to shop for pants in stores anymore.

There are times when I'm driving home after a day's shooting, thinking to myself, That scene would've been so much better if I had written it out.

Well, as you know, I'm really only happy when I'm on stage.

She didn't even tell me! ... She told my assistant!

If they were pictures of the Yankees of the past 50 years, I'd do just as well.

People have often wondered how they'd feel if they were adopted. I think it's funny.

The biggest part of it is editing. It takes longer to edit one episode than to shoot it and write it.

I'll have a vanilla... one of those vanilla bullshit things. You know, whatever you want, some vanilla bullshit latte cappa thing. Whatever you got.

I aspire to be like that character. He's honest. It's the things I'm thinking but not saying.

Luck always plays a part for everyone, whether they want to admit it or not. I was very lucky, and I know it.

Making a woman laugh. What is that about? And the prettier the woman, the more satisfaction I get. It doesn't make any sense, but I'm being honest.

Sometimes you have to wander a bit, and do what you don't want to in order to figure out what it is you're supposed to do.

I once stopped to pick up a girl, and then there was this creepy-looking guy standing behind the bushes waiting to jump out and get in, too. So I just quickly drove away.

I couldn't walk up to a woman at a bar and say hello.

You know, when you do standup there are certain requirements that you have to do like you have to go on stage and when you get introduced you have to say "Hey,how ya doin'? How are ya?" I couldn't do it. It was false.

I have no sense of well-being. There's no chance the well will run dry.

I'd much rather be on stage talking to a couple of retards for twenty bucks than sitting at my desk thinking up jokes for...well let's say a few dollars more.

Sometimes you have to rely on sex and bodily functions.

I don't like to analyze my music too much. It just comes welling up out of the depths of my soul.

Zero, zero belief in myself. And it's changed somewhat, but there's still a lot of that in me.

A date is an experience you have with another person that makes you appreciate being alone

Hitler really ruined that mustache for everybody. It’s really an interesting mustache, but now, no one can wear it.

Most practical jokes, I'll feel too bad for the other person so I'll stop just before the punchline.

I learned the first night that IHOP's not the place to order fish.

I'm Larry David. I happen to enjoy wearing women's panties.

I'm trying to elevate small-talk to medium talk.

Weathermen merely forecast rain to keep everyone else off the golf course

I've always loathed rich people, so I've become who I've loathed, which makes it doubly difficult, if you can follow me.

Pretty good. Pretttttttty, pretttttttttty, pretttttty good.

You can't do anything in life. The social barriers in life are so intense and horrific that every encounter is just fraught with so many problems and dread. Every social situation is a potential nightmare.

Woody Allen likes to do a lot of master shots. He likes to get the whole thing in one take, and so you could be going along doing a scene, and then the next to last line, all of a sudden, you stumble, and you have to go back to first base.

In those days, reserve duty lasted for six years, which, I might add, was three times as long as service in the regular army, although to be perfectly honest, I was unable to fulfill my entire obligation because I was taking acting classes and they said I could skip my last year.

I don't write shows with dialogue where actors have to memorize dialogue. I write the scenes where we know everything that's going to happen. There's an outline of about seven or eight pages, and then we improvise it.

A place to go - that's what my mother always instilled in me. You need a place to go. And you're worthless unless you have a place to go.

I got a Swede lawyer?!? She's gonna get everything!

I don't like talking to people I KNOW, but strangers, I have no problem with.

Do not degrade me in the military uniform I wear for it represents the love I have for my country, and the sacrifices myself and millions of other American soldiers make everyday to protect the freedom we enjoy by living in the United States of America.

I find human contact repulsive.

Anything that's for free, people will take. They don't discriminate.

It's not every day that you get to be affectionate around something, it just doesn't happen that often.

I'd like to start a family, but you have to have a date first.

You write about what you know.

The closest I ever came to death was masturbating with a 104-degree temperature.

I'm a walking, talking enigma. We're a dying breed.

I never thought for a second that anything I ever did was going to make someone cringe. That never occurred to me.

I tend to stay with the panic. I embrace the panic.

I wanted to make a living, but I really was not interested in money at all. I was interested in being a great comedian.

There's also a certain rhythm to the way Jews talk that might be funny.

I'm really only happy when I'm on stage. I just feed off the energy of the audience. That's what I'm all about - people and laughter.

Anytime I'm involved with anything that's well-received, it's a surprise to me.

Golf and dating don't mix.

If I was going onstage, of course I would talk about it. How could I not?

I'm not quite as anonymous as I was.

I'm anti-cheese in a salad.

I think golf is literally an addiction. I'm surprised there's not Golf Anonymous.

I tell people that I've now done one decent thing in my life. Albeit inadvertently.

I gave a funny speech at my wife's birthday party, and I'm thinking, 'Hey, I've still got it.'

I don't like people cleaning my room.

I defy anyone to produce any evidence that the word 'happy' has ever crossed my lips. I am not now, nor have I ever been, 'happy.'

I don't like to be out of my comfort zone, which is about a half an inch wide.

It's always good to take something that's happened in your life and make something of it comedically.

I've been in therapy. I know enough about myself now to know that I really don't need to know anymore.

I like to be quiet, and let people find me rather than having to shout at them.

I'm surprised sometimes at how some of my actions are misinterpreted.

Well, after the divorce, I went home and turned all the lights on!

I tolerate lactose like I tolerate people.

I'm not a person who embraces challenges. I run from challenges. I break world records running from challenges.

I'm not interested in closure. Some people just have heart attacks and die, right? There's no closure.

Once I know people know who I am, it gives me a lot of licence and freedom to behave in ways I wouldn't normally.

Sometimes I have these fantasies of just moving to a foreign country and coming back with a full head of hair. Or not even come back! Make a new life there with hair... Change my name, just see what happens.

Most people are completely unaware of their breath. They violate your space, they have no idea that they have halitosis.

If I wasn't a golfer, I would still be miserable - but not as miserable.

I'm surprized Hitler didn't round up the toupee people.

Whenever something good happens to me, it's usually followed by something terrible.

You have to discover when you're inadequate to be funny and you don't know you're inadequate when you're a kid.

I guess I still feel that I'm a comedian; if I had to pick one thing that I feel like I could do, it would be that. That doesn't mean that I like it, but I feel that's what I am.

I still think of that guy I was without a wife or kids, and I still want to entertain that guy. The lonely guy, the frustrated guy, the guy with no money - this is the guy who needs to laugh.

I was very fortunate to hook up with Jerry in the first place. The network was already committed to doing something with him, so I skipped a couple of hundred steps right there.