Eddie Izzard

Edward John "Eddie" Izzard (born 7 February 1962 in Yemen) is an English stand-up comedian, actor, writer, and political activist.

Quotes

  • In my first year I was taught about the slide rule. They said, "The slide rule is important. Without it you can do nothing. The slide rule is the modern weapon of efficiency. With the slide rule you can get from here to the stars. Buy it, use it your slide rule!" Within one year it was, "Burn the slide rule. The calculator can add up with none of this fucking sliding the shit around and working out where that bit in the middle goes. Smash it over your head."

Live at the Ambassadors (1993)

  • Religion and philosophy, philosophy and religion they're two words which are both different. In spelling.
  • Agatha Christie? We go back years, me and Ag. She's a she's just a she's dead, isn't she?
  • She said, "Spell 'ant' ", and I wrote out the entire alphabet. She said, "That doesn't spell 'ant' ", and I said, "It's in there somewhere! There's the A, there's the N, there's the T the rest are silent!"
  • And we're going, "Oh, Captain Clever! Whoa-ho-ho! Rattle it, and if it doesn't go off, it can't be a bomb!"
  • And in the back, behind there, not giving a damn and all the bright colours and stuff just drops off when you get to this section. White wrap-up, big red letters; LARD! Eat this shit and die! LARD! Kills you stone dead! Does blood move through your arteries? Block it up with LARD! Nutritional advice? No! Proteins? What the hell are they? Carbohydrates? Never heard of them, Guv! Fat? You bet your bum! We've got some some of that, yes sirree Bob! Oh, we're full of that, mate [later on] Remember that campaign for butter, "Welcome back to butter"? "Welcome back to LARD!" We never went nowhere! Just been sitting at the back, quietly waiting like Jack Nicholson

Unrepeatable (1994)

  • I am a lesbian trapped in a man's body.
  • We throw sticks at dogs, that's the level we have dogs at. You'd never dream of throwing one for a cat. We throw sticks for dogs, and dogs go, "Oh, he's dropped his stick! I better go and get that. [mimes chasing after the stick] Saw you dropped your stick there, thought I'd bring it back. And you hang on! [mimes giving the stick back and follows it with eyes as it's thrown again] Did you see me just bring that back? And then you you dropped it again? This is very weird. I don't know what's going on here. [mimes bringing the stick back again] Now, hang on to it this time, I don't want to piss about all the time. You think I enjoy this? There you don't fucking throw it!" That's why the third time, when they come back, they won't give it to you. They go, [through clenched teeth] "No I won't let you take it!"
  • Cats have a scam going you buy the food, they eat the food, they fuck off; that's the deal.
  • You have no control over your cat! You can't say to your cat, "Cat, heel! Stay! Wait! Lie down! Roll over!" 'Cause the cat's just gonna be sitting there going, "Interesting words have you finished?" While you're shouting all this to your cat, your dog's next to you, going [mimes obeying all commands] "What the hell are you doing? I'm talking to the cat!" "Oh, I'm sorry!"
  • And cats leap up walls! Six foot walls, they just go *fwang* [mimes cat jumping] Lands perfectly, and turn turn and back flip and forward flip, and dismount! They always land perfectly, they never do that sort of wobbly-gymnast [mimes wobbling] You never see cats on a wall having a problem, do you? You never see a cat going, [mimes tentative walk] "Fucking 'ell! I'm not sure about this " and a cat on the ground, going, "Easy, Ginger! I'll walk you down!"
  • [About homophobes] As long as they're homophobic behind closed doors, and don't hurt anyone, I'm fine with it.

Definite Article (1996)

  • "My name is Mrs. Smith, I've made apples out of bread and dripping, a bit of green paint, and corrugated iron." "No, these are horrible apples, Mrs. Smith. Go away, Mrs. Smith! Go away until your daughter has a baby." "Shag, daughter, shag! It's a marketing idea, shag for babies! [mimes running back] My daughter's had a baby, I'm Granny Smith now!" "Come in, Granny Smith! You wonderful idea, you! Come in with your shiny apples."
  • Pears can just fuck off too. 'Cause they're gorgeous little beasts, but they're ripe for half an hour, and you're never there. They're like a rock or they're mush. In the supermarket, people banging in nails. "I'll just put these shelves up, mate, then you can have the pear." So you think, "I'll take them home and they'll ripen up." But you put them in the bowl at home, and they sit there, going, "No! No! Don't ripen yet, don't ripen yet. Wait til he goes out the room! Ripen! Now now now!"
  • What? The Carthaginians are attacking? God, I knew they'd do that. What? They are attacking over the Alps? Damn, I knew they'd do that. What? They're coming on elephants? Where'd they get the elephants? There aren't any elephants in Europe. This I got to see are you sure? It's not just a typo mistake? Perhaps the Carthaginians are attacking over the Alps and they are in their element? Kind of upbeat, you know. They're coming on fucking elephants, huh.
  • If you've never seen an elephant ski, then you've never been on acid.
  • Day One: Rang bell, cat fucked off. (Oh dear.)
    Day Two: Rang bell, cat went and answered door.
    Day Three: Rang bell, cat said he had eaten earlier. (Cheeky bugger.)
    Day Four: Went to ring bell, but cat had stolen batteries.
    Final Day Day Five: Went and rang bell with new batteries, but cat put his paw on bell so it only made a thunk noise. Then cat rang his own bell.
    I ate food.
    • On Pavlov's cats.
  • Off to Azerbaijan!

Glorious (1997)

  • Beekeepers, yes they've gotta want to be "I want to be a beekeeper! I wanna keep bees! Don't wanna let them get away; I wanna keep them! They have too much freedom I want bees on elastic, so when they get pollen, they come back here! My father was a beekeeper before me, his father was a beekeeper before him; I wanna walk in their footsteps." And their footsteps were like this: [running wildly from imaginary bees] "I'm covered in bees!"
  • I like my coffee like I like my women... in a plastic cup.
  • I like my women like I like my coffee... covered in beeees!
  • [God, who was James Mason, to Noah] "Noah, stop what you're doing and build me an ark!" [Noah, who was Sean Connery] "I'm working on a speed boat at the moment. Much more exciting. It'll really kick ass, give great photographs for the people in Bible."
  • So then God created the world, and on the first day he created light and air and fish and jam and soup and potatoes and haircuts and arguments and small things and rabbits and people with noses and jam more jam, perhaps and soot and flies and tobogganing and showers and toasters and grandmothers and, uh Belgium. And the second day he created fire and water and eggnog and radiators and lights and Burma and things that go "urh" and and Colonel Gaddafi and Arthur Negus. On the third day he probably got lists and said, "I can't remember what I've invented now. I've just been ad-libbing so far."
  • "Give us cash! I steal from the rich and give to the poor! I'm trying to be a myth; give us cash!" "No, I'm not gonna give you cash." "Go on, I steal from the rich. Are you rich?" "No, I'm comfortable." "That's no good, I can't steal from the fairly well off and give to the moderately impoverished! That's not gonna swing, is it?"
    • On Robin Hood.
  • I don't have techno-fear, I have techno-joy! I love technology! I love to get a new machine. Every time I get a new machine, I think, "This is the one! I won't have to work again; I've got this thing!" And if you have techno-joy, you get the instructions, you unwrap it, and you throw the instructions out the window! [mimes doing so] Forget them! Fuck 'em! [mimes turning on a computer] On. [mimes typing] I must know how this works, I've used machines before!

Dress to Kill (1998)

  • We stole countries with the cunning use of flags. Just sail around the world and stick a flag in. "I claim India for Britain!" They're going "You can't claim us, we live here! Five hundred million of us!" "Do you have a flag ? "What? We don't need a bloody flag, this is our country, you bastards!" "No flag, no country, you can't have one! Those are the rules... that I just made up!...and I'm backing it up with this gun, that was lent from the National Rifle Association."
  • Someone's killed 100,000 people. We're almost going, "Well done! You killed 100,000 people? You must get up very early in the morning! I can't even get down the gym. Your diary must look odd: 'Get up in the morning, death, death, death, death, death, death, death lunch death, death, death afternoon tea death, death, death quick shower ' "
  • They went to the Moon and they brought back rock. Trouble is, we've got rock. That was the one thing we didn't need, wasn't it? "Rock, Neil? I don't know whether you looked at the planet before you took off, but it's made of fucking rock!" "But it's Moon rock " "Oh, fucking hell, this is Earth rock, Neil, come on! Have you heard, on the stock market, rock's gone up three points? No, it hasn't, has it? 'Cause it's fucking rock! We wanted diamonds, sherbet or a squirrel with a gun!"
  • His name changed from Gerry Dorsey to Engelbert Humperdinck. I mean, I just wanted to be in the room when they were working that one through: "Zingelbert Bembledack! Yingybert Dambleban! Zangelbert Bingledack! Wingelbert Humptyback! Slut Bunwalla!" "What?!" "All right, Kringelbert Fishtybuns! Steviebuns Bottrittrundle " "No, Gerry Dorsey! I like Gerry Dorsey!" "No, we can't, who we got? Zingelbert Bembledack, Tringelbert Wangledack, Slut Bunwalla, Klingybun Fistelvase, Dindlebert Zindledack, Gerry Dorsey, Engelbert Humptyback, Zengelbert Bingledack, Engelbert Humperdinck, Vingelbert Wingledanck " "No, no, go back one!"
  • I had to chat up girls, and I'd only tagged them before. I didn't have the verbal power to be able to say, "Susan, I saw you in the classroom today. As the sun came from behind the clouds, a burst of brilliant light caught your hair, it was haloed in front of me. You turned, your eyes flashed fire into my soul, I immediately read the words of Dostoevsky and Karl Marx, and in the words of Albert Schweitzer, 'I fancy you.' " But no! At 13, you're just going, " 'Ello, Sue. I saw you in the room... I've got legs, have you? Oh yeah... Do you like bread? I've got a French loaf. [mimes smacking her with the loaf and dashing off] Bye! (I love you!)"
  • (Talking about American and British Language) You say 'erbs and we say herbs, because there's a fucking 'H' in it.

Circle (2000)

  • The Crusades were, "We kill you in the name of Jesus!" "Wait, we have Jesus, too! He's a prophet in our religion! We kill you in the name of Jesus!" "Do you? Well, we kill you for your dark skin, for Jesus was a white man from Oxford!" "No, he wasn't! He was from Judea! Dark-skinned man, such as we!" " Really? Look, we've come all this way. Would you mind awfully if we hacked you to bits? Just for the press back home."
  • Pope Pius XII was meant to go and castigate Hitler for being a [air quotes] "Genocidal Fuckhead [air quotes again] with bunny rabbit ears". But he didn't, he wimped out, and for that history has renamed that Pope as "Pope Gutless Bastard I."
  • There's 200,000 gods in Hinduism and they've got gods like Shiva, the God of Creation and Destruction. Which is a good god to be, 'cause you can go *whoom* [creates thing] "What do you think? Do you like that? You don't like that?" *whoom* [destroys thing] If you're just the God of Creation, you're going *whoom* "Do you like that? You don't? All right, I'll put it in the garage shit, I haven't got a garage!" *whoom* [creates garage]
  • Makeup's just crazy, anyways. Native Americans used to wear it, and it did all right for them until, uh well, until you killed them all, I suppose.
  • But there must've been a Death Star canteen, yeah? There must've been a cafeteria downstairs, in between battles, where Darth Vader could just chill and go down: "I will have the penne all'arrabbiata." "You'll need a tray." "Do you know who I am?" "Do you know who I am?" "This is not a game of who the fuck are you. For I am Vader, Darth Vader, Lord Vader. I can kill you with a single thought." "Well, you'll still need a tray." "No, I will not need a tray. I do not need a tray to kill you. I can kill you without a tray, with the power of the Force, which is strong within me. Even though I could kill you with a tray if I so wished, for I would hack at your neck with the thin bit until the blood flowed across the canteen floor." "No, the food is hot. You'll need a tray to put the food on." "Oh, I see, the food is hot. I'm sorry, I did not realize...Ha..ha..ha.h.. I thought you were challenging me for the fight to death." "A fight to the death? This is a canteen, I work here." "Yes, but I am Vader. I am Lord Vader? Every one challenges me to a fight to the death."

Sexie (2003)

  • So uh I'd better explain the tits. Um didn't have those at school. Wanted to, but not in the school curriculum even though I asked.
  • No matter how much makeup I wore, people just kept saying "Yes, sir! Would you like tea with that, sir?" "Yes, I would like tea. Why don't you put it on my breasts?" "Certainly. Tea for this man's breasts! Anything else, sir?"
  • So, I thought, it's not working. So I threw my breasts out of the window of my Lamborghini, in my mind no, I threw the breasts out of the window of my Ford Fiesta, in my mind. Actually, I threw them out over the handlebars of my bicycle [mouthing the words] in my mind. And they hit a small child, who ran, "Mum, mum, mum I've been attacked by jellyfish!"
  • Racist people, interestingly, are never as polite as smokers. Have you noticed that? Smokers always go, "Do you mind if I smoke? Oh, you do? Okay, I'll go outside and have a cigarette." Racist people never go, "Do you mind if I'm racist? Oh, I'll go outside fucking blue people, eh? Coming here, steal our hamsters "
  • Homo Sapiens wouldn't have made it, and everything would be different! Television would be you know, Book of the Month club on television would be:
    Neanderthal presenter: "And now we have the professor uh whaddayou think of this book?"
    Neanderthal professor: "Wha' ?"
    Presenter: "What do you think of this book, in a critical way?"
    Professor: "It's all right "
    Presenter: "There you have it. It's all right!"
    • On the consequences if Neanderthals had not become extinct

Stripped (2009)

  • So I've learnt that the world is 4,500 million years old. If you're very religious, then it's not 4,500 million years old, it's 6,000 years old. One of these is not correct.
  • And I think that if God did exist, he had many children. I think Jesus proves this. Jesus must be the seventh son of God. A-sus, B-sus, C-sus, D-sus, E-sus, F-sus, G-sus. That's just logic. That's just mathematical. And T-sus would always be fucking about. And P-sus does deliveries. C-sus started the Roman Empire. Cae-sus. F-sus, City in Turkey. B-sus was covered in something. Some people applauding there; other people going, "What?" … B-sus was covered in bees.
  • Scrabble was invented by Nazis to piss off kids with dyslexia. This is true, they proved this one. The word dyslexia was invented by Nazis to piss off kids with dyslexia.
  • The main point is, did God tell him to make a boat, or did Noah just use his captain common sense? Cause there are a number of us, if we were somewhere where it was raining and raining and raining and raining and raining and raining and raining and raining, and we had a big pile of wood, some of us might put two and two together and go, "I'm gonna make a bloody boat!" Others might go, "I'm gonna make a hairdresser's", "I'm gonna build a monkey emporium.", "I'm gonna build a big pair of wooden shoes, that would fit a giant." … But he made a boat. Oh, he was quite sensible! And what did he put on the boat? His family. What else? Animals. Which animals? Any he could find. Did he put two of every animal in the world on the boat? No! How can I be so sure? Try it!
  • Charles Darwin wrote a famous book in 18[gibberish]. And that book was an interesting book, cuz it was called "Monkey-Monkey-Monkey-Monkey-Monkey-Monkey-You".
  • [Talking about the royal family] 'Cause they got in at '52, and then immediately the Queen introduced the new then in the '60s, the Queen decided to change the way that and she encouraged people to and in the '70s she completely redistributed and realised she had too much wealth, so she decided to then in the '80s, they set up a charity to do and then they encouraged other people to and in the '90s, they just totally relaxed, and they said, "Everyone, why don't you " And then in the 2000s, they've set a great example by stop me at any point. I think she's got 20 years left. She's in there, but she essentially does what she does on the stamps.
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