75 Carol Burnett Quotes

American actress and comedian Carol Burnett is the perfect example of rags to riches.

Carol Burnett was born with the name Carol Creighton Burnett and is known for 'The Carol Burnett Show' that aired on CBS originally. Carol Burnett has been successful in life on television, on stage, and in film.

Carol Burnett had to go through a lot of hardships in life and has worked really hard to reach the top of the food chain where we see her today. She has always been successful as a writer, singer, actress, and comedian. Here are some of the most funniest and inspirational quotes from Carol Burnett.

Laugh your hearts out with these funny Carol Burnett quotes said by none other than the noted comedian and actress herself, as she often does in her popular show 'The Carol Burnett Show'.

"Comedy is tragedy plus time."

"I had a good loud voice and I wasn't afraid to be goofy or zany."

"If you want to know the feeling [of labor pain], just take your bottom lip and pull it over your head."

"I'm really not that funny in real life. But I am the best audience one could find. I love to laugh."

"The audience is never wrong."

"The first time someone said, 'What are your measurements?' I answered, '37, 24, 38 – but not necessarily in that order.'"

"Adolescence is just one big walking pimple."

"I don't have false teeth. Do you think I'd buy teeth like these?"

"Funny is funny. I dare anyone to look at Tim Conway and Harvey Korman doing the dentist sketch, which is more than 40 years old, and not scream with laughter."

"My favorite comedian, of course, is Tim Conway. He has a way about him - being that belly-laugh kind of funny, and he has the improvisational skills, too. I've never seen anybody better."

"I was once asked to do my Tarzan yell at Bergdorf Goodman, and a guard burst in with a gun! Now I only do it under controlled circumstances."

"My mother was very funny. My dad had a great sense of humor. My grandmother, too."

"It costs a lot to sue a magazine, and it's too bad that we don't have a system where the losing team has to pay the winning team's lawyers."

"I have an iPhone, and I can text, and I can use the phone, and I can even take pictures with it."

"I loved doing 'The Family' with Eunice and Mama. They were very interesting because there were no jokes written into those sketches. It was all character-driven. And sometimes it got a little heavy."

"I love 'Modern Family.' And I love 'Glee' - the singing, the music - Jane Lynch just kills me."

"As far as sitcoms go, I thought Jenna Elfman in 'Dharma and Greg' was a wonderful physical comedienne who had great timing."

"Steve Martin in 'All of Me,' when he did that whole thing where he was possessed by the spirit in his body? It was brilliant."

"I do think there are some great female comics: Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Kristen Wiig, Maya Rudolph. They're the whole ball of wax."

"I am not a joke-teller. Stand-up, I couldn't do."

Read some of the best Carol Burnett quotes that mark her view of life with impeccable humor.

"We don't stop going to school when we graduate."

"Words, once they are printed, have a life of their own."

"I couldn't get the laughter out of my head. It wasn't career. It wasn't even a choice. It was a calling."

"I wish my mother had left me something about how she felt growing up. I wish my grandmother had done the same. I wanted my girls to know me."

"I don't remember a time when I wasn't waiting for a scab either to grow or to fall off my knee."

"I liked myself better when I wasn't me."

"But I didn't ask to have somebody nose around in my private life. I didn't even ask to be famous. All I asked was to be able to earn a living making people laugh."

"I think we're here for each other."

"It all happened the way it was supposed to. I wouldn't change anything. I had such a great run."

"Celebrity was a long time in coming; it will go away. Everything goes away."

"I've always been optimistic. And I have a feeling that it happened because of going to all those movies with my grandmother in the '40s because there was no cynicism."

"I can't tell a joke to save my soul. It's just not my thing, though I love to listen to jokes."

"I'm glad I was born when I was. My time was the golden age of variety. If I were starting out again now, maybe things would happen for me, but it certainly would not be on a variety show with 28 musicians, 12 dancers, two major guest stars, 50 costumes a week by Bob Mackie. The networks just wouldn't spend the money today."

"Everybody I know who is funny, it's in them. You can teach timing, or some people are able to tell a joke, though I don't like to tell jokes. But I think you have to be born with a sense of humor and a sense of timing."

"Originally, I came from Texas, and we lived on - I guess you'd call it welfare, what we called relief."

"I had always been quiet and studious in school. I was the high school editor of the newspaper."

"I do the 'New York Times' crossword puzzle every morning to keep the old grey matter ticking."

"I love Maya Rudolph. She's very multitalented herself."

"I'm like your mother, your sister, whatever."

"My grandmother and I would go see movies, and we'd come back to the apartment - we had a one-room apartment in Hollywood - and I would kind of lock myself in this little dressing room area with a cracked mirror on the door and act out what I had just seen."

"My grandmother and I saw an average of eight movies a week, double features, second run."

"My favorite is doing the television show, as a variety show, every week. If the show wasn't that great one week, we could always come back and apologize, you know?"

"I loved the Kennedy Center Honors because you just sit there, smile, wave, and cry."

"When I was starting out in this business, that was the norm. You did it all. You looked around, and entertainers could dance, sing, play the piano, act, make you laugh."

"My first book was an open letter to my three daughters."

"I struggled for a while, but when I was cast in an Off-Broadway show called 'Once Upon a Mattress,' that kind of put me on the map."

"I was very entertained by Betty Grable and Judy Garland."

"Jimmy Stewart and Lucille Ball were so unique."

(Get hooked by some Carol Burnett quotes.)

Apart from laughter and comedy, Carol Burnett has managed to weave her own dream in real life. Get inspired by some inspiring Carol Burnett quotes.

"Only I can change my life. No one can do it for me."

"Before you go to bed, write down three 'grateful' for the day and three 'did wells' (they can even include something as simple as doing the laundry)-the results can be amazing!"

"If someone tells you that you cannot do something and you believe it, they are right."

"You have to have faith that there is a reason you go through certain things. I can't say I'm glad to go through pain, but in a way, one must, in order to gain courage and really feel joy."

"When you have a dream, you've got to grab it and never let go."

"It's also selfish because it makes you feel good when you help others. I've been helped by acts of kindness from strangers. That's why we're here, after all, to help others."

"If you see a kid in school, who is a little shy … that's when you should reach out. When you do, you are going to open up a flower and discover something wonderful."

"Because nobody goes through life without a scar."

"I never regretted turning down anything, I never regretted losing a job because I always felt something else was out there."

"I was raised going to the movies with my grandmother as a kid. And then I'd come home, and my best friend and I would act out the films that we saw."

"I really enjoy connecting with the audience."

"I didn't really get comfortable until I got to UCLA, and I had to take an acting course because I was studying theater arts."

"Ask anyone who's successful how they got there, you're going to hear a different story."

"When I was in college at UCLA, I took a playwriting course. I was all set to be a writer. But I had to take this acting class as a theater arts major. I had to do this scene in a one-act comedy. I just said this line, and then... this laugh happened. I thought, 'Whoa. This is a really good feeling. What have I been missing?'"

"In '57, I got a job at the Blue Angel nightclub, and a gentleman named Ken Welch wrote all my material for me. I lived at a place called the Rehearsal Club that was actually the basis for a play called Stage Door."

"Just scream! You vent, and the body just feels good after a good old yell."

"When things are a disappointment, try not to be so discouraged."

"Because of YouTube, I'm getting fan mail from 10-year-olds and teenagers and college kids."

"On the good days, my mother would haul out the ukulele and we'd sit around the kitchen table - it was a cardboard table with a linoleum top - and sing."

Read some intriguing Carol Burnett quotes that will blow your mind.

"It's almost impossible to be funnier than the people in Washington."

"No one ever said life was fair. Just Eventful."

"You have to go through the falling down in order to learn to walk. It helps to know that you can survive it. That's an education in itself."

"You do have to love your kids enough to let them hate you. But it's the disease that's hating you, not them."

"Giving birth is like taking your lower lip and forcing it over your head."

"I have always grown from my problems and challenges, from the things that don't work out, that's when I've really learned."

"But I don't begrudge anybody, because I know how hard it is to have that dream and to make it happen, whether or not it's just to put a roof over your head and food on the table."

"When someone who is known for being comedic does something straight, it's always "a big breakthrough" or a "radical departure." Why is no one ever says that if a straight actor does comedy? Are they presuming comedy is easier?"

"I love writing. I love the idea of typing and seeing it on the computer and printing it out myself and, you know, moving sentences around. I like that."

"I come from Texas, and my grandmother and mother were born in Arkansas."

"When I left 'The Garry Moore Show,' I signed a 10-year contract with CBS."

"I'm hooked on Glenn Close in 'Damages.'"

"Well, I don't know how astute I am, but I did want to be a journalist when I was growing up."

"I was kind of shy as a kid. I was a pretty good student. I was a wallflower, or nerd, if you will."

"I'm into 'House of Cards.' 'Breaking Bad' - my God, did I binge on that!"

"I eat very well, and I do Pilates."

"My interesting diet tips are eat early and don't nosh between meals. I mean, I can pack it away."

"I'm not always optimistic. You wouldn't have all cylinders cooking if you were always like Mary Poppins."

"I think the reason I was successful is that I was never cynical."

"I don't watch sitcoms. I really don't. My problem with them is they take so long to film them that there's no spontaneity. I want to see that."

"My preference is for people who can do sketch comedy or situational comedy, where it's not a joke, but it's telling a story."

"My grandmother and I followed my mother here, to a house a block north of Hollywood Boulevard but a million miles away from Hollywood, if you know what I mean. We would hang out behind the ropes and look at the movie stars arriving at the premieres."