As a stand-up, as a storyteller, as an improviser, I've done thousands of shows. They allow me to work out new material that might turn into something later. They let me keep my muscles sharp for when the rent-paying gigs do come along. They keep me sane.

Chris Gethard

Anytime I audition for something, it's always a question of whether or not the people I'm auditioning for understand I'm an improviser and I like to do that, and if they like that or if they just want someone who's going to do what's written.

Adam Pally

I've always been an improviser. I was one before I knew even what the word was... And acting, that I've been doing since I was 5.

Alan Arkin

Vince Vaughn is a master improviser.

Alan Tudyk

The lifelong goal of an improviser is to listen to what the other person is saying, taking it in, and responding.

Ali Farahnakian

Baseball players practice, runners practice, so how can you practice being funny? You get up onstage. You train as an improviser, playing make-believe, using the vernacular of improvisation, saying 'yes and' to other people's ideas, making statements.

Ali Farahnakian

Coming out of Dallas and doing commercial work in Dallas - if you had improv background in Dallas, then you were instantly shot to the top of the list of commercial bookings because they loved improvisers because you could elevate the material.

Allison Tolman

As a stand-up, as a storyteller, as an improviser, I've done thousands of shows. They allow me to work out new material that might turn into something later. They let me keep my muscles sharp for when the rent-paying gigs do come along. They keep me sane.

Chris Gethard

When you hear Bach or Mozart, you hear perfection. Remember that Bach, Mozart and Beethoven were great improvisers. I can hear that in their music.

Dave Brubeck

Personally, I've found one of the more stimulating ways of playing in recent times has been to kind of move outside the free improvised area and work with people who are probably improvisers but they have a particular way of working.

Derek Bailey

John Hughes loved improvisers.

Edie McClurg

We're lucky enough, especially in these 'Madagascar' films, to be working with some of the best people in the industry, who are not only great actors, but great comedians and improvisers and filmmakers. And they then become a part of creating their characters.

Eric Darnell

What has impressed me the most about the Italians whose tables we've sat at is that they are traditional cooks but also outrageously innovative. These people are wild improvisers.

Frances Mayes

As an improviser I'm now pretty comfortable with trios, so I'm thinking of working up to quartets.

Fred Frith

I kept on buying records and listening to them. Finally, I was able to hear the relationship between the jazz improvisers' solos and the underlying structure that it's based on, the chord progression. That was pretty easy to do in the swing era, y'know, when jazz was, like, pop music, you know. It had made the charts and everything like that.

Harvey Pekar

My brother was an improviser. He's now a lobbyist, but he used to perform improv in the city when he was in high school, and one of the funniest guys I know to this day.

Jake Johnson

People know my background and for people who need an improviser, I'm one of the people they think to use if I'm appropriate for the part.

Jason Mantzoukas

As an improviser, my nature is to take a theme and constantly rework it.

Jason Moran

I'm always in awe of improvisers that make something out of complete nothing.

Kathryn Hahn

I felt that a cappella was the improv world with music, where it's very serious, and there are groups and competition, and some people become famous, and there's a language we speak from one improviser to another.

Kay Cannon

I realized that improvisers should probably always have time off. But musicians are always gigging and never have a chance to stop for a minute - unless something drastic occurs.

Keith Jarrett