Jason Mantzoukas

I like antagonizing the audience, poking at them.

Maybe it's just my improv and sketch background, but I'm a lot more comfortable in a group. I like sharing focus and populating an ensemble.

A good comedy with a purpose behind it is exhilarating.

I was funny in a way that was not dissing the teacher; I was funny just to be funny. A real charmer with a prominent mustache that he didn't know what to do with and a smart-alecky attitude.

Looking the way I look, whenever anybody's looking for a light brown funny guy, I get the call... I'm 100 percent Greek, but I look like I could be Indian or Middle Eastern or Hispanic. If it's ethnic, they'll try and put me in it.

At a certain point, I had to be like, 'I will not do any more auditions with a Middle Eastern accent.'

I've numerous times heard mothers in stores tell their children not to go near me.

When I was a child, I was referred to as the Danny Kaye of the family, because I was always impersonating and mimicking people. I was a song and dance man.

I completely understand social media as a method of promotion and digesting information, but it just seems like a colossal waste of time to me, and there's a million other ways I'd rather waste my time.

I was in band that played mostly covers for a while, and the bands that we would cover were, like, the alternative rock bands of that day: we did a Jane's Addiction song and a Faith No More song. All the kind of alternative radio of that time, the late '80s, basically.