Harold Ramis Quotes

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Harold Ramis

Profession : Actor

Birth : November 21, 1944

We all wish we could be in more than one place at the same time. People with families feel guilty all the time-if we spend too much time with our family, we feel we're not working hard enough.

Harold Ramis

I always point out to my Passover guests that the Hebrews were not living in isolation. They were at the crossroads of several great, elaborate cultures with their own mythology and religion and art and architecture and cultural belief. In fact, so many of the mythologies of the world describe the same events, just from different points of view.

Harold Ramis

I never work just to work. It's some combination of laziness and self-respect.

Harold Ramis

How one handles success or failure is determined by their early childhood.

Harold Ramis

Acting is all about big hair and funny props... All the great actors knew it. Olivier knew it, Brando knew it.

Harold Ramis

Life doesn't care about your vision. Stuff happens, and you've just got to deal with it. You roll with it; that's the beauty of it all.

Harold Ramis

I'm at my best when I'm working with really talented people, and I'm there to gently suggest or guide or inspire or contribute whatever I can to their effort.

Harold Ramis

Comedy and tragedy co-exist. You can't have one without the other. I'm of the school that anything can be funny if seen from a comedic point of view.

Harold Ramis

You just make sure you don't screw it up. It's going to work as long as you don't mess it up. Hopefully you have plenty of those moments in a big comedy.

Harold Ramis

I had this 'War and Peace' thing of wanting to experience war as a kind of incredible human enterprise. I even applied to Officer Candidate School. Then the practical side of me kicked in and I thought, 'I really don't want to get drafted.' So I went down to the physical and checked every psychological disorder and drug on the medical history form.

Harold Ramis

If Chevy Chase had not been an actor, he might have been a very popular guy in advertising, or whatever field he would have gone into, because of his charisma.

Harold Ramis

As a director on 'The Office,' there's a tremendous weight that comes with directing features. I was being asked to direct a show that had already won an Emmy for Best Comedy. Steve Carell and the cast had already won the Screen Actor's Guild Awards.

Harold Ramis

Nothing reinforces a professional relationship more than enjoying success with someone.

Harold Ramis

Chicago still remains a Mecca of the Midwest - people from both coasts are kind of amazed how good life is in Chicago and what a good culture we've got. You can have a pretty wonderful artistic life and never leave Chicago.

Harold Ramis

My first few films were institutional comedies, and you're on pretty safe ground when you're dealing with an institution that vast numbers of people have experienced: college, summer camp, the military, the country club.

Harold Ramis

If life only has the meaning you bring to it, we have the opportunity to bring rich meaning to our lives by the service we do for others.

Harold Ramis

I believe things happen that can't be explained, but so many people seem intent on explaining them. Everyone has an answer for them. Either aliens or things from the spirit world.

Harold Ramis

Films are big hits when they touch a lot of people. Things are not funny in a vacuum, they're funny because we respond to some personal dislocation, some embarrassment, some humiliation, some pain we've suffered, or some desire we have.

Harold Ramis

I never read Playboy before I started working there and stopped reading it the day I quit.

Harold Ramis

A psychologist said to me, there are only two important questions you have to ask yourself. What do you really feel? And, what do you really want? If you can answer those two, you probably can leave your neuroses behind you.

Harold Ramis