T. J. Miller
When you spend such a large portion of your life working - and it's not fun, and you're worried about getting sued or fired for saying the wrong thing or for acting crazy at a work party - then what has work done to America? That's the impetus to have a huge office Christmas party.Collection: Christmas
'Extract' was kind of a grown up 'Office Space' in the sense of talking about the ennui of being a successful person in America if you don't have some real passion in your life for something to care about.Collection: Space
Life is hard. Not great. Kind of tragic.Collection: Great
Sometimes, things need to be so understated on film that I don't even see them as funny, which isn't my favorite style, comedically. When I watch film comedy, I like people that are a little bit more alive on the screen and wound up. I like volatility and unpredictability and other long words like those.Collection: Funny
By the very nature of satire or parody, you have to love and respect your target and respect it enough to understand every aspect of it, so you can more effectively make fun of it.Collection: Respect
'Yogi Bear' changed my life in ways that I can't explain because it's not a full feature on me. 'Yogi Bear' - there's everything before 'Yogi Bear,' and there's everything after 'Yogi Bear.' Like a major car accident, or the birth of Christ.Collection: Car
There's nothing I would love more than to host an awards show where I'm nominated for an award - that is so funny to me.Collection: Funny
I wouldn't want to be Superman. Batman would be cool. But the one I've always wanted to play is the Joker. There is a maniacal and dangerous side to me.Collection: Cool
I'm a Nietzschean scholar. I've read an immense amount about nihilism and existentialism.
Effective satire has to be almost identical to the subject that it is skewering.
If you're a comedian, you can change peoples lives for the better in much smaller increments - not their entire life, but for 15 minutes or a half hour.
I don't believe in alcohol. It's a sort of a medicinal necessity for the human condition, none of that stuff. I'm not a gambling man.
Hosting is a thankless job.
There's sketch, improv, writing, acting, music, and badminton. Those are the seven forms of comedy. But I do like the idea of being an auteur in the sense of writing and being in your own stuff.
I would say that awards are for children. Because children need a tangible representation of their achievement. And as adults, you have to settle for the respect and admiration of your peers.
Slowly but surely, I went through different phases of fame, and each rises you further into isolation and alienation.
There is no place for a person like me in a world that only takes itself seriously. Satire is so necessary but fairly ineffective.
I always like to have a buffer between me and journalism in general. Not just a reporter, but journalism.
There's sketch, improv, writing, acting, music, and badminton. Those are the seven forms of comedy.
I don't know how much the economy has changed since Jonathan Swift's 'A Modest Proposal.'
I've stated that it's possible the only reason I'm in show business is that I have such a strange, particular head of hair. That, and I can grow a red beard.
I sound like a chain-smoking drag queen after a hard night of singing 'Tie a Yellow Ribbon'.
I feel a strong affinity to Ke$ha and Katy Perry and a lot of these women who are really pushing the girl power femme fatale thing. It's fun, and it's unapologetic, and they tell women they can do whatever they want, and that's true, and that's a message that I want to carry, to tell girls they can do whatever they want.
I consider myself a fairly ethical individual while I do have a lot of dichotomies within me. We're all victims of our own hypocrisy at times.
I have perfectly symmetrical ankles.
I acted in high school and studied at the British American Drama Academy in Oxford for one summer. I minored in theater, and I was always acting growing up, but really, I was just more interested in the comedy of it all.
I do like the idea of being an auteur in the sense of writing and being in your own stuff.
I laugh at absurdity hardest, then stories, then observations, then bearded men on roller skates.
I love writing but not crazy meticulous/prepared enough to be a director. I'd work as a gaffer on something.
Stuff that I write isn't as similar to the stuff that I'm in, but I don't really care. I just do comedy.
I know about the tech industry in that I follow what apps are hot and software development. I know my way around different browsers. I know how to restart a computer.
I don't really know how to act that much. I'm quite good at comedy, but it's mostly acting naturally.
I love mispronunciations. I love when people mispronounce things.
You just put yourself into your work, and you can do anything you want, depending on how hard you want to work for it.
My father really told me, seriously, if you want something, you can have it, but you may have to work harder than anyone else around you.
I don't sit and write stand-up material; I come up with an idea onstage.
Funny is as funny does, and funny puts on a walrus mask and slowly gyrates in a mall food court. I laugh at absurdity hardest, then stories, then observations, then bearded men on roller skates.
Always remember: My general theme is 'There is no message.' There never has been. Stop trying to find the message or the meaning in everything. That's. My. Theme.
It's always fun to agree to be in a movie when you have no idea what it's actually going to be!
Everybody asks me what it was like to be in my underwear for my network television debut.
I acted in high school and studied at the British American Drama Academy in Oxford for one summer. I minored in theater, and I was always acting growing up and stuff, but really, I was just more interested in the comedy of it all. So for me, it's always comedy, and then acting is just one medium of comedy.
Most things I get hired on, I get hired because I improvise something funny, or they just think I look weird.
It doesn't matter to me if I'm in love with my performance, so I watch all of my performances to understand and learn from them and figure out what's working and what's not. And I see the movies that I'm in in the theater a lot.
I'm always so amazed by which performances work really, really well and which ones don't. But I think it's just mostly, 'She's Out Of My League,' so many people saw that movie on DVD and on the plane. Just millions of people saw that movie. That's the reason I'm somewhat famous.
I care less about selling tickets and getting Twitter followers than I do about making as many people laugh as I can. I'd rather make people laugh than make them know who T.J. Miller is.
It's much better to wreak havoc on a show and be a maniac than promote myself. Plugs and anecdotes aren't really in line with my beliefs. Besides, if someone sees me on a morning show and thinks, 'That's not funny; this guy is crazy,' then I don't want them to come to the show anyway.
I drink a fair amount of ramen noodles.
I think it is very important to be a method actor.
The moment in which you make somebody laugh, you're only doing it to make them laugh and be happy. Then afterward you can be like, 'Oh, I just want the attention. I feel so good that everybody's listening to me and I got the approval that I need.'
It's okay to take yourself too seriously if you're a serious actor and you've got the scrubs on. And then with me, it's kind of like, well, I'm a comedian, I'm making fun of everybody and everything. And I'm making fun of myself. I'm having fun making fun of and for other people.