Robert Orben Quotes

35 Sourced Quotes

Most people want to be delivered from temptation but would like it to keep in touch.

Robert Orben
Humor starts like a wildfire, but then continues on, smoldering, smoldering for years.

Robert Orben
Humor is the most honest of emotions. Applause for a speech can be insincere, but with humor, if the audience doesn't like it there's no faking it.

Robert Orben
A young person today has a nanosecond attention span, so whatever you do in a humor has to be short. Younger people do not wait for anything that takes time to develop. We're going totally to one-liners. Telling a joke is risk taking. Younger people are more insecure and not willing to put themselves on the line, so a quick one-liner is much safer.

Robert Orben
Every speaker has a mouth; An arrangement rather neat. Sometimes it's filled with wisdom. Sometimes it's filled with feet.

Robert Orben
Humor is a marvelous communications tool, as Reagan has demonstrated so well. He has weathered many a storm that others might not have. With Reagan, people just say, 'There he goes again.' A sense of humor allows a president to back off a little from the tensions of the moment and take a calmer view of things.

Robert Orben
George Bush has turned into the playboy of the Western world. He shows up at Chinese restaurants, at movies, at the Kennedy Center. He seems to be a totally relaxed, enjoy-the-moment kind of individual. He has shown a sense of playfulness that is very appealing. It shows he isn't overwhelmed by the overwhelming responsibilities he is taking on.

Robert Orben
Very few people ever meet celebrities. All we really know is what we read about them and the most memorable lines are jokes. That's how we tend to define what we think of a public figure.

Robert Orben
Nowadays, you cannot be a very Effective political figure without Having a demonstrable sense of humor. People take to it.

Robert Orben
When we laugh we temporarily give ourselves over to the person who makes us laugh.

Robert Orben
It always seems to someone outside the business that it is very difficult to write for a comedy show because it must be done quickly. Actually, it is much easier to write this humor than to do a joke or a show from scratch, because the audience knows the plot. Just mention what is going on and then deliver the punch line.

Robert Orben
Noise pollution is a relative thing. In a city, it's a jet plane taking off. In a monastery, it's a pen that scratches.

Robert Orben
Wall Street is where prophets tell us what will happen and profits tell us what did happen.

Robert Orben
I'm beginning to wonder about my broker. Yesterday I told him to buy a hundred shares of A.T.&T. He said, 'Would you spell that?'

Robert Orben
The Playboy Calendar this year has some tiptop models. Any more top and they'd tip.

Robert Orben
Lincoln was known to have walked miles to borrow books, to get the most rudimentary form of education. So what do we do on his birthday? We close the schools!

Robert Orben
They're combining that new fertility drug with a birth control pill for people who don't want triplets.

Robert Orben
Humor gives presidents the chance to be seen as warm, relaxed persons. Humor reaches out and puts its arm around the listener and says, 'I am one of you, I understand,' and implicitly it promises, 'I will do something about your problems.'

Robert Orben
Do you ever get the feeling that the only reason we have elections is to find out if the polls were right?

Robert Orben
It may be the way the cookie crumbles on Madison Avenue, but in Hong Kong its the way the egg rolls.

Robert Orben
The chance to be seen as a warm, witty guy is too good an opportunity for a politician to miss.

Robert Orben
As much as we admire all the characteristics of a Ronald Reagan, as soon as something goes wrong, people will hate those same characteristics.

Robert Orben
Love is so confusing - you tell a girl she looks great and what's the first thing you do? Turn out the lights!

Robert Orben
Live your life so that if someone says 'Be yourself' it's good advice.

Robert Orben
The secret of writing comedy is to know where it's all going, then get ahead of it.

Robert Orben
I understand the big food companies are developing a tearless onion. I think they can do it—after all, they've already given us tasteless bread.

Robert Orben
If somebody accuses you in a story of being a crook, you can demand that they prove it. But if a comic says it and you protest, people say, 'What's the matter, you can't take a joke?'

Robert Orben
I remember when humor was gentle pokes. I used to call it 'arm around the shoulder' humor. Now they go for the jugular and they take no prisoners. It's mean, mean stuff.

Robert Orben
It's mandatory in this day and age to be considered to have a sense of humor and to demonstrate it. You're not paying me for a joke, You're paying me for the right joke.

Robert Orben
Dick Cheney has to be the kindliest attack dog ever.

Robert Orben