"My career in stand-up gave me a vestigial sense of the crowd that I have relied upon over the last twenty-seven years. In the world of filmmaking, where there is no audience, where, in fact, quiet on the set is required, I sometimes try to determine if a particular idea is funny. I picture myself at the back of a darkened theater, watching the bit in question unspooling on the screen, and somewhere, in the black interior of my brain, I can hear the audience’s response. Thankfully, when the movie is finally screened, I discover that my intuition is not always right. If it were, there would be no surprises left; I would be living in a dull comedy heaven."

Steve Martin