I'm more influenced by characters than standups. I love strong, comic women because it's so hard, and I have so much respect for anyone who can do it. I'm a big fan of Tina Fey and Amy Poehler and people like that.

Dad's cancer experience included periods of relatively good health as well as bouts of hospitalisation as he coursed his way through a variety of different chemotherapy treatments.

I normally feel relief that I didn't die onstage or forget all my lines. Then I start remembering that I have to do it again sometime, and it'll probably not go as well.

I do love live performing, but I'm not a stand-up naturally, and I don't like the lifestyle of working just in the evenings at clubs and stuff - not a natural gig-er.

I mean, I guess I started during the comedy boom, so it was literally like, on Sunday you could decide you wanted to be a comic, and on Monday, you could be on stage.

Doing comedy around the world is a way of finding out how people tick.

The war on drugs is a joke. We spend $40 billion a year, and the proof that it's a failure is that any kid can get almost any drug they want in any city in America within half an hour.

Comedy's the ultimate pill that helps the really hard truths and hard facts go down, right?