I still get very scared when I step in front of a live audience.
Adam SandlerThere’s something about being in front of a live audience that’s fun. It’s a really interesting, very electric, very alive, and intense experience, and you can’t get it anywhere else. And I’ve been doing it since I was 23, so it’s part of my being – it’s part of my fabric as a person.
Steven WrightForty is when you actually begin even deserving to be on stage telling people what you think.
Jerry SeinfeldVery rarely do I talk off the top of my head on stage. I’m not an improv guy. I’m a writer-guy who presents what he’s written.
Steven WrightIn oratory the will must predominate.
David HareIn retrospect, I can see I couldn’t talk to people face to face, so I got on stage and started screaming and squealing and twitching about. Ha! Like, that sure made sense!
David ByrneWhen you walk out onstage in front of 65,000 people, it can bring you to tears.
Taylor SwiftI think Pat Robertson is a terrific fellow.
Billy GrahamI write all my sermons.
Joel OsteenI liked school, but I used to dread those moments when the teacher would call me up to give an oral report. I forced myself to deal with it and not dwell on the class in front of me – to keep a straight face, give the report and concentrate on getting it right. That’s normally how I perform. That’s how I am.
Steven WrightIt could be if I fight in front of one person or one million people. It’s still the same emotions.
Conor McGregorRead my lips: no new taxes.
George H. W. BushI have been – I have spoken in Bir Zeit a number of times.
Noam ChomskyBefore I refuse to take your questions, I have an opening statement.
Ronald ReaganI have spoken to Chinese leaders occasionally on human rights, but I’ve always done it in private.
Henry KissingerA person standing in front of an audience without enthusiasm for his subject and his actions is disconnected from his spirit.
Wayne DyerPeople make suggestions on what to say all the time. I’ll give you an example; I don’t read what’s handed to me. People say, ‚Here, here’s your speech, or here’s an idea for a speech.‘ They’re changed. Trust me.
George W. BushI don’t think there is a single social issue I haven’t spoken on.
Billy GrahamI think that if I would talk on a political subject, if I talk about it, it would divide the audience on that issue. That’s not my issue.
Billy GrahamHow can a president not be an actor?
Ronald ReaganI don’t want to spend the rest of my life giving speeches.
Colin PowellI’ve been known to preach.
Kevin HartA master performer like Bill Clinton never lost sight of the fact that as president he had to project confidence and power, but if he was speaking to a group of autoworkers he would adjust his accent and his words to fit the audience, and do the same for a group of executives.
Robert GreeneThe Four Levels of Comedy: Make your friends laugh, Make strangers laugh, Get paid to make strangers laugh, and Make people talk like you because it’s so much fun.
Jerry SeinfeldChildren always turn to the light.
David HareIf somebody’s dumb enough to ask me to go to a political convention and say something, they’re going to have to take what they get.
Clint EastwoodI don’t have any oratory skills. But I would not use them if I had.
Noam ChomskyAs President Nixon says, presidents can do almost anything, and President Nixon has done many things that nobody would have thought of doing.
Golda MeirI’ve been thinking of humorous things since I was… I can’t remember when. All the way through elementary school, all the way through junior high, all the way through high school, through college and after college, I was thinking of the same kinds of things that I say in front of an audience now.
Steven WrightTell the audience what you’re going to say, say it; then tell them what you’ve said.
Dale CarnegieI’m mortified to be on the stage, but then again, it’s the only place where I’m happy.
Bob DylanAs a matter of fact, I didn’t make a political speech outside of my state for 20 years.
Joe BidenNo matter how much you rehearse on that stage, once you add 30,000 screaming people with flashing cameras into the equation, it’s pretty intense.
Lady GagaThere are always three speeches, for every one you actually gave. The one you practiced, the one you gave, and the one you wish you gave.
Dale CarnegieI’ve had the honor of speaking at many commencements.
Kamala HarrisI never lecture, not because I am shy or a bad speaker, but simply because I detest the sort of people who go to lectures and don’t want to meet them.
H. L. MenckenI’ve always had to conquer fear when I’m on stage. Basically, I was and still am a very shy person. It’s absolutely in conflict with what I do. But once I deliver the first joke I’m okay. It’s like I’m out there all by myself just delivering my lines to nobody in particular without ever trying to notice the audience in front of me.
Steven WrightFor, if a good speaker, never so eloquent, does not see into the fact, and is not speaking the truth of that – is there a more horrid kind of object in creation?
Thomas CarlyleGospel music is never pessimistic, it’s never ‚oh my god, its all going down the tubes‘, like the blues often is.
Brian EnoA man may speak very well in the House of Commons, and fail very completely in the House of Lords. There are two distinct styles requisite: I intend, in the course of my career, if I have time, to give a specimen of both.
Benjamin DisraeliIn my opinion, the only way to conquer stage fright is to get up on stage and play. Every time you play another show, it gets better and better.
Taylor SwiftChemistry can be a good and bad thing. Chemistry is good when you make love with it. Chemistry is bad when you make crack with it.
Adam SandlerI’m much more comfortable and confident running out on the field in front of 70,000 people instead of standing in front of a camera trying to say some lines. The people who do that as a profession are very talented because it’s certainly not easy.
Tom BradyWherever I go meeting the public… spreading a message of human values, spreading a message of harmony, is the most important thing.
Dalai LamaWhen I was younger and did a stand-up gig, it would take me two weeks to recover. Sometimes I’d get so panicked that I would stutter.
Adam SandlerPowerPoint makes us stupid.
Jim MattisWhen Caroline Kennedy managed to say ‚you know‘ more than 200 times in an interview with the New York ‚Daily News,‘ and on 130 occasions while talking to ‚The New York Times‘ during her uninspired attempt to become a hereditary senator, she proved, among other things, that she was (a) middle-aged and (b) middle class.
Christopher HitchensI like to think my dad was easygoing and kind, and I think some of those things have been passed down. I am like him in a sense of being positive and hopeful. He was compassionate, and I’ve got a lot of that in me as well.
Joel OsteenIt’s really fun to be on stage in front of people.
Billie EilishThe most successful politician is he who says what the people are thinking most often in the loudest voice.
Theodore RooseveltI can move any crowd.
DJ KhaledIn the television age, the key distinction is between the candidate who can speak poetry and the one who can only speak prose.
Richard M. NixonI’m a Sagittarius, and one of our major qualities is that we’re blindly optimistic.
Taylor SwiftI realised a little bit to my astonishment that I can give a lecture for a thousand people, and there will be this tumultuous applause, so, you know, I have the feeling well, it can’t be all that bad.
Edmund HillaryIt usually takes me more than three weeks to prepare a good impromptu speech.
Mark TwainOur forces saved the remnants of the Jewish people of Europe for a new life and a new hope in the reborn land of Israel. Along with all men of good will, I salute the young state and wish it well.
Dwight D. EisenhowerSpeakers who talk about what life has taught them never fail to keep the attention of their listeners.
Dale CarnegieIt’s very intense to be in front of a live audience. It’s just an amazing experience. It’s dangerous. Everything out there is heightened. The bad stuff is extra-worse. The silences are extra-silent. The good stuff is amazing. It’s electric when you walk out there. For 90 minutes, you’re on this other planet.
Steven WrightThe science of psychology has been far more successful on the negative than on the positive side… It has revealed to us much about man’s shortcomings, his illnesses, his sins, but little about his potentialities, his virtues, his achievable aspirations, or his psychological health.
Abraham MaslowSo when I speak in front of thousands, tens of thousands of people, I don’t really get nervous because I know what I want to say and I know what message I want to give.
Greta Thunberg