Jeff Dunham is one of the most well known American ventriloquist with a long list of other talents to include stand up comedian and producer. Appearing one some of the top late night shows from David Letterman to The Tonight Show, here is a list to some of the best Jeff Dunham quotes ever documented.
“A comedian needs to have his own filters, needs to know his audience, how far he can push things.”
“A lot of my best stuff is just ad libs on stage, and that’s one thing that I’ve gotten back to at the live show.”
“All through college, I was searching for characters that would make me unique and set me apart from the typical ventriloquist with the typical dummy that was the little boy, cheeky hard figure like Charlie McCarthy.”
“But the mechanics of learning to ‘throw your voice’ are pretty simple. Anyone with a tongue, an upper palate, teeth, and a normal speaking voice can learn ventriloquism.”
“Growing up, I thought it would be great if I could do big theaters. Now we’re doing arenas.”
“I taught myself computer. Then Macintosh came along, and it became a really bad addiction. If I wasn’t in show business, I’d have pocket protectors growing out of my chest. I do everything on it. It’s kinda sick.”
Great meeting you guys at the show in Dawson Creek @amidorablecrochet! Thanks for bringing mini, crocheted me! pic.twitter.com/5RfLTYBgPE
— Jeff Dunham (@jeffdunham) April 11, 2016
“I think there’s a lot of, unfortunately, unfunny ventriloquists out there, so they’ve got a bad rap.”
“I try to make the majority of my audience laugh. That’s my audience. They’ll laugh at the dead terrorist.”
“I’m a pretty good ventriloquist, but it’s the entertainment value and the laughs that keep people sitting there and wanting more.”
“In 1980, when I graduated from high school, my goal was to be on ‘The Tonight Show’ with Johnny Carson at least once before our ten-year class reunion. Our class reunion was in June of 1990, and I was on ‘The Tonight Show’ in April 1990, so I made it by a few months”
“It’s amazing how these little guys can say things that a mortal human could never get away with. There’s some sort of unspoken license… when outlandish things come out of an inanimate object, somehow it equals humor.”
“It’s strange because even in the vaudeville days, ventriloquists were never the main attraction. They were the guys brought out to stand in front of the curtain while sets were being changed.”
#TBT to when Walter and I were the long and short arm of the law on Sonny with a Chance. pic.twitter.com/h5wxvuSgey
— Jeff Dunham (@jeffdunham) March 11, 2016
“I’ve always said that instead of watching a guy juggle seven things amazingly I would rather see a really bad juggler who’s really funny.”
“I’ve skewered whites, blacks, Hispanics, Christians, Jews, Muslims, gays, straights, rednecks, addicts, the elderly, and my wife. As a standup comic, it is my job to make sure the majority of people laugh, and I believe that comedy is the last true form of free speech.”
“My goal in any show is to make people laugh. That’s the No. 1 thing. Everything else pales in comparison to that.”
“My mother and my father have always supported me. Now in their eighties, they actually clamor onto the tour bus with me once or twice a year so they can watch the performances and hear the crowds.”
“My parents never discouraged me. There were a couple times when my dad criticized a couple things that I did, but it was nothing. So through the bad shows, I never wanted to quit.”
“Stand-up comedy is tough right now. Anybody can come to a concert, tape you, and put you up on the Internet. You either fight it or embrace it.”
— Jeff Dunham (@jeffdunham) December 14, 2015
“The best place to find material is in real life. I’ve always maintained that it’s not until the mid-20s that you have enough of a life to draw from. There’s nothing better for a comic than to go through some bad stuff – and some good stuff, like getting married.”
“The only way a ventriloquist speaks differently is that he forgoes using his or her lips, and learns to reproduce sounds using the tongue, upper palate, and teeth only. Those ‘difficult’ letters are B, F, M, P, V, W, and Y.”
“There are not that many ventriloquists out there who build their own characters. I love that because they are uniquely mine.”
“Up until college age I was using the typical little-boy dummy that sits on the knee and makes woodpecker jokes. My first original character didn’t happen until later, and that was Jose the Jalapeno on a Stick.”
“We just got a tour bus. I didn’t know tour buses could be this nice. It’s just me, Brian Haner the guitar guy, the tour manager and a writer. We laugh ourselves silly.”
“When I was eight years old, I got a dummy for Christmas and started teaching myself. I got books and records and sat in front of the bathroom mirror, practising. I did my first show in the third grade and just kept going; there was no reason to quit.”
Here is one brief clip of Jeff Dunham with his character Walter during an episode titled, ‘Politically Unbalanced.’
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