255 Funniest Quotes and Jokes by Chris Rock

Wealth is not about having a lot of money; it's about having a lot of options.

I live in a neighborhood so bad that you can get shot while getting shot.

You can only offend me if you mean something to me.

A hot dog with an interesting person is an amazing meal.

A cat, by any other name, is still a sneaky little furball that barfs on the furniture.

You don't need a critic to tell you people aren't laughing.

Hollywood's just not funny.

I love what's happened to me, but when I was a kid, I wanted to be the president of the United States.

We got so much food in America we're allergic to food. Allergic to food! Hungry people ain't allergic to sh*t. You think anyone in Rwanda's got a f***ing lactose intolerance?!

You don't need no gun control. You know what you need? We need some bullet control. Man, we need to control the bullets, that's right. I think all bullets should cost $5,000. $5,000 for a bullet. You know why? 'Cause if a bullet costs $5000, there'd be no more innocent bystanders.

If you live with a single parent, you don't see compromise. You witness a grown person living in a world where they do what they want to do. When you are raised by two parents, you are constantly watching compromise take place. Just by observing that, it made me a better person.

And even if you get shot by a stray bullet, you don't gotta go to no doctor to get it taken out, whoever shot you will take they bullet back! I believe you have my property!

There's bad and then there's EDDY CURRY BAD.

If you wanna get away with murder, all you gotta do is shoot somebody in the head and put a demo tape in their pocket! 'This is a rap killing! Let's get outta here!'

I think it's better to have ideas. You can change an idea; changing a belief is trickier.

When you're doing a big-budget movie and you're four on the call sheet, you've got a lot of free time.

My mother always says: You know better, so you'll be punished. Your friends don't know better, so they won't be punished. They can go snatch chains and they'll be fine. But if you snatch chains, you'll end up in jail because you know better.

I pride myself on being the guy who can do Def Comedy Jam and Charlie Rose. And do well on both.

Standup comedians are attracted to one another because of their faults. So we're all kind of messed up in the same way, and once I was around a group of people that saw the world in a different way, it's like this is where I need to be.

I never had the confidence to say I was going to be in front of the camera as a comedian until I saw Eddie Murphy years later.

The Democrats should have an empty chair on stage for the entire DNC, and when anyone asks who it belongs to, they can say Osama bin Laden.

The thing about Barack Obama, just from being around him, is he's cooler than the other politicians, but just nerdy enough to do the job. Like you can't be really cool and be the president.

I believe you got my property?

The U.S government hates rap music.

I'm old enough to remember when there were no black quarterbacks -- there were no blacks on TV. I hope my son or daughter doesn't have to be as fixated on race as I am, because he or she will grow up in freer times.

When you meet somebody for the first time, you're not meeting them. You're meeting their representative.

Everything's funny -- in the right context and done by the right person.

There are people who would like to get rid of minimum wage. But we have to have it, because if we didn't some people would not get paid money. They would work all week for two loaves of bread and some Spam.

When you've been on a ghetto diet your entire life, you're just happy to get a large soda instead of a medium.

I don't write jokes first. I write down topics. I think of what I want to talk about, and then I write the jokes -- they don't write me... And even if you don't think it's funny, you won't think it's boring. You might disagree, but you'll listen. And maybe even laugh as you disagree.

Yeah, it's unfair that you can get judged by something you didn't do, but it's also unfair that you can inherit money that you didn't work for.

Men are only as unfaithful as their options.

Just to be clear, Ray Rice was not fired for beating his wife. He was fired because a video of him beating his wife was released.

You know those guys that go to the strip club at the daytime? If you're at a strip club, and the sun is out, you got some problems!

Is America ready for a black president? Well, I say we just had a retarded one. When did being black become a bigger deterrent than being retarded?

There's always a moment in any stand-up show I do where people are booing. They kinda boo a premise. And then I bail myself out with a joke. But it's like trying to do movies where there's a dramatic undertone.

You got a gun, you don't have to work out.

Do you know?
What the fuck do women want?
l know what you want: everything.

Community college is like a disco with books: Here's ten dollars; let me get my learn on!

Comedians are the one who have to tell the emperor he has no clothes on.

I think all the funny people were bullied. When they talk about outlawing bullying, it's like, what? You want no Comedy Central?

You'd got a baseball game, or a football game, basketball game, USA! USA! USA! Hey, calm down! Got a little German on it, don't you think?

If you told me two years I would miss the greatest basketball game ever to hang out with Nathan Lane, I'd say, 'You're crazy!'

I see guys who can't make 10 percent of what I make, and yet they have four Bentleys, three houses, and four bodyguards.

You know the world is messed up when the tallest man in the NBA is Chinese, the best golfer is black, and the best rapper is white.

Black movies don't have real names, they have names like Barbershop. That's not a name, that's just a location.

Black people dominate sports in the United States. 20% of the population and 90% of the final four.

People are always going to, you know, find something wrong with people who are not the exact same as them. That's just what it is. Black, white, short, tall, religions, whatever. People are bad.

I don't need a president with a bucket list!

I ain't shootin' nobody. So call me a faggot! When the war's over, I'll be the faggot with two legs, thank you!

Carol Leifer is funny, really funny.

No matter what happens or how difficult things become, you will eventually feel better.

People want what they want. And I guess that is a reason we have this big credit card problem and a lot of these foreclosures.

Most people don't realize this, but you can eat organic, all natural, gluten-free food without telling everyone around you.

Stand-up is the only career like that where once you get really big at it, people kind of encourage you not to do it.

So if you're black or brown, you can make money in America, you can get rich in America... but whatever you decide to do, it better be positive, 'cause if one person is harmed, you will be destroyed. You see Oprah, she just be giving away money. She's doing that to keep the Feds off her back.

Stop the violence! Can't we all just get along?

You know what GED stands for? Good Enough Diploma.

You can never make a woman happy, it's impossible. I've never met a happy woman in my life. They're always complaining about something.

I'm severely overrated. I'm just above a hack.

God bless America. And no place else.

I used to have horrible cars that would always end up broken down on the highway. When I tried to flag someone down, nobody stopped. But if I pushed my own car, other drivers would get out and push with me. If you want help, help yourself -- people like to see that.

The material comes from whenever you realize that you and someone else have something in common. So any conversation you've had more than once, anything you see happening to you that you see happening to a friend, you go, Hmmm, that's a situation I can make funny.

I do what I can do when I can do it.

I'm happy if everybody else is. I'm a big brother, the oldest. If you're happy and I'm not, I'm cool with that. If I'm happy and you're not, I'm sad.

A black man will be elected President of the United States. I'm sorry, that's in the year 10,000.

It used to take years to become a junkie. But crack cut that down to 37 minutes.

Actually, I think all addiction starts with soda. Every junkie did soda first. But no one counts that. Maybe they should. The soda connection is clear. Why isn't a presidential commission looking into this? Or at least some guys from the National Carbonation Council.

I can see the humor in just about any situation. After I lost my dad, I realized that none of us should take things too seriously, because everything except death works itself out.

A comedian has to live in his head. All this comedy comes from a lonely place. When you're surrounded by an entourage, you're not living in your head.

I hate niggas! I hate em! I wish they'd let me join the Ku Klux Klan!

Not a Harvard-type education, just a not-sticking-up-a-liquor-store-type education.

Men lie the most, women tell the biggest lies.

Never go to clubs with metal detectors. Sure it feels safe inside. But what about all those niggas waiting outside with guns? They know you ain't got one.

I got love from my family. I don't really need love from a paper, you know what I mean? I can't get too happy because somebody said something nice about me. I appreciate it, but let's not get it twisted -- this is not changing my life.

When you become a comedian a lot of stuff that made you laugh before just stops. You stop watching your old cartoons you used to watch. You stop reading the funnies. It's like working at a strip club. You don't come home and turn on the Playboy Channel.

I'm like the Hulk on stage. It's way over the top. That's Bizarro Chris. Sometimes I get off stage and go What did I say?! I'll watch one of my stand-up specials a year later and go Eww, that was mean.

I learned pretty quickly that it's your WORK ETHIC that LEVELS THE PLAYING FIELD. Education helps, but I've met failures who have Ph.D.s. I believe the hardest worker is always going to win.

I'm looking forward to not being tired around my child. My father was tired a lot. I want to play ball with my child without having to grab my shoulder because I'm not physically fit. And I want to really teach my child and become his or her friend.

All you crazy white people I'm American!, all you did was come out of your mother's pussy on American soil. That's it. That's it! What, you think you're better than somebody from France 'cause you came out of a pussy in Detroit?

The thing I try to get across to the writers -- and I do a lot of writing, too -- is that when I do stand-up, nothing I talk about is funny. Everything is really sad and tragic and then I make it funny.

Kids raised on a culture of We're not going to keep score in the game because we don't want anybody to lose. Or just ignoring race to a fault. You can't say the black kid over there. No, it's the guy with the red shoes. You can't even be offensive on your way to being inoffensive.

Emotional affairs, those are the only real affairs; those are the real ones.

When people try to read between the lines -- critics, they have a job. Their job is to make something bigger than it is.

I've remade a few movies and they all have one thing in common: great endings. If you're going to remake something, make sure that ending is tight. It's a little less challenging, if you have a great ending. If you don't have a great ending, don't remake the movie.

I was at Michael Jackson's house, and this kid runs out, 'Wait, save me!'

I always say about my daughters, they save me from my miserable self. They take me out, you know, a comedian, you could live in your head a lot. And you're writing and you're doubting. But when I'm with my kids and my family, it's all about them.

When you're white, the sky's the limit. When you're black, the limit's the sky.

I never watched the Oscars. Come on, it's a fashion show ... What straight black man sits there and watches the Oscars? Show me one. And they don't recognize comedy, and you don't see a lot of black people nominated, so why should I watch it?

Shaq is rich. The white man who signs his check... is wealthy. Ah, here you go, Shaq. Go buy yourself a bouncing car. Bling, bling!

We got no wealthy black people. We got rich people. Shaq is rich. The guy who signs his checks is wealthy.

Men do not settle down. Men surrender.

Oprah is rich; Bill Gates is wealthy. If Bill Gates woke up tomorrow with Oprah's money, he'd jump out of a window and slit his throat on the way down saying, 'I can't even put gas in my plane!'

I took my AlDS test. You start reflecting... You start thinking about every nasty, skank-ass... It's like the movie Scrooge, and the Ghost of Pussy Past comes.

Hollywood's racist. Hollywood is sorority racist. It's like -- we like you, Rhonda, but you're not a Kappa.

My relationship with my daughter is gonna affect her relationship with men for the rest of her life... Sometimes I'm walking with my daughter. I'm pushing her in the stroller, and sometimes I just pick her up and stare at her, and I realize, my only job in life is to keep her off the pole.

My mother is the kind of woman you don't want to be in line behind at the supermarket. She has coupons for coupons.

That's a sure sign someone is going crazy -- when he refers to himself in the third person, talks in low tones, and walks around wearing shades all day!

I've been away from my two daughters at a very important time in their life.'I have missed most of Girl Scout cookie season.Last night Zahra, my youngest called me up and said :Daddy how come we never sell the most cookies? How come Mrs. Dunn wins every year?'

If you're the president you only have two jobs: peace and money.

An entertainer's reputation as a live act is the most valuable thing he or she can have. If people know you give good shows, you'll never be broke for the rest of your life.

Do you know what the good side of crack is? If you're up at the right hour, you can get a VCR for $1.50. You can furnish your whole house for $10.95.

People basically aren't that racist. They want their laughs. If I make a white guy laugh, he's gonna come see me. He's not gonna go see the white guy who doesn't make him laugh just because that guy is white.

If you see a black woman with an overweight white man, you know she got effed up credit!

If you can keep your son off the pipe and your daughter off the pole, you're ahead of the game.

In the world of animation, you can be anything you wanna be. If you're a fat woman, you can play a skinny princess. If you're short wimpy guy, you can play a tall gladiator. If you're a white man, you can play an Arabian prince. And if you're a black man, you can play a donkey or a zebra.

You know you're rich when you have to drive for a half hour to get to your house once you're on your property.

Don't argue! You cannot win, you cannot beat a woman in a arguement. It's impossble you will not win. Cause men, we are handicapped when it comes to arguing cause we have a need to make sense.

Men are handicapped when it comes to arguing, 'cause we have a need to make sense.

I'm a rap comedian the same way Bill Cosby is a jazz comedian, Cosby's laid back. I'm like, bang, bang bang, right into it.

I say everything's about company. A gourmet meal with an asshole is a horrible meal. A hot dog with an interesting person is an amazing meal.

Nobody ever says, 'Hey daddy, thanks for knockin' out this rent.' 'Hey daddy, I sure love this hot water.' 'Hey daddy, it's easy to read with all this light.' Nobody give a fk about dads!

I think if I were to get as big as I could get, it does change your mind-state. I think like the little man. I think like the underdog. I don't want to change that.

I see as white people finding loopholes in the slavery laws.

Whenever I go out with other married couples, I like to bring along a single crackhead. Just to spice things up.

You know, some people say life is short and that you could get hit by a bus at any moment and that you have to live each day like it's your last. Bullshit. Life is long. You're probably not gonna get hit by a bus. And you're gonna have to live with the choices you make for the next fifty years.

A black Christian is like a black person with no memory.

Even if you meet the perfect person, it ain't gonna be at the perfect time. You're married, they're single. That's right. You're Jewish, they're Palestinian. You're a Mexican, they're a raccoon. You're a black woman, he's a black man.

They're working their way down. Next year, Todd Bridges gets the award. When I was a kid I wanted to be Eddie Murphy and now I'm a rip-off of Eddie Murphy.

The only acting you ever see at the Oscars is when people act like they're not mad they lost. Nicole Kidman was smiling so wide, she should have won an Emmy at the Oscars for her great performance. I was like, If you'd done that in the movie, you'd have won an Oscar, girl.

I love seeing black people do normal things, being judged as normal people.

It's my real name. My mother's name is Rose Rock. It was the worst name as a kid to have. They called me Piece of the Rock, Plymouth Rock, Joe Rockid, and Flintstones. Now they call me Mister Rock.

Whatever your pleasure, I can facilitate. You need weed, you need meth -- hey, you need Prozac, I'm your man. I know how you white boys always deal with that depression. I mean me personally, I don't understand what you white boys are all depressed about. Hey, you're white! Smile!

The advantage that my children have is that my children are encountering the nicest white people that America has ever produced. Let's hope America keeps producing nicer white people.

Here's the thing. When we talk about race relations in America or racial progress, it's all nonsense. There are no race relations. White people were crazy. Now they're not as crazy. To say that black people have made progress would be to say they deserve what happened to them before.

You won't be able to take your eyes off the next four presenters: Salma Hayek and Penelope Cruz.

Learn how to cook. Read books that will educate you. Get an education. Get a career. And support yourself. And live in a section of town that isn't conducive to violence.

It's easier to get on show business, the hard part is to maintain. Nobody stays famous forever.

When you make comedy, you make it for the people and you try to have as many screenings and as many tests and you do focus groups and you read the cards and you try to give the people what they want in this comedy.

I don't think my comedy is that political. It's more social. But whatever. When you make comedy and you do stand-up, you work alone. Movies have to go under so much scrutiny. A stand-up special is a vision, and a movie is a consensus in a lot of ways.

I get approached to do shows all the time. There's a lot of money in sitcoms, but I've never been the kind of guy who wanted to do one. I don't think people want to see me saying Honey, I'm home. It's just not my thing.

Eddie Murphy is to comedians what Nicki Minaj is to Spanx.

If you're a black Christian, you have a real short memory.

It's weird with stand-up comedy. It doesn't really translate worldwide. I want to figure out how do I make it worldwide. Do a special in Africa. Can't beat that. Pull that off, then I will have done something.

Stand-up comedy is like the lowest medium in all of show business in levels of respect.

I always say there's no more little girls, just boys with breasts. Girls act like boys nowadays. Teenage girls, they go after boys. They're predatory just like boys. My goal is to keep my girls, girls.

My kids don't have a trust fund, they have a debt fund. Oh my God, they're $4 million in the hole.

The only reaction that frightens me is people not laughing. It's extraordinary to me when you get a laugh. That you can go in front of a bunch of people you never met before, you can say some stuff and they all laugh in unison -- that's amazing. It's a miracle.

I love my life, but I don't think I'm any happier than my younger brother Andre, who drives a garbage truck.

You only know that you're smart because you're around dumb people from time to time!

If you want to prevent abortions, you make sure everyone has health care, a high school education and birth control. Not the exact opposite.

America is the only place where people go hunting on a full stomach.

Give me a black man, a white woman, a giraffe, a zebra anything but another white man! That last one f***ed up my roof!

Whoever you hate will end up in your family. You don't like gays?

You're gonna have a gay son. You don't like Puerto Ricans? Your

daughter's gonna come home with Livin' La Vida Loca!

Happy white peoples independence day the slaves weren't free but I'm sure they enjoyed fireworks.

Smart is knowing if you're dumb. Knowing when to shut up and to listen to people that are smarter than you.

If a kid calls his grandma Mommy and his mama Pam, he's going to jail!

You could be married and bored or single and lonely. Ain't no happiness nowhere.

President of the United States is you know, our boss, so you know, the President and the First Lady are kinda like the Mom and the Dad of the country. And when your Dad says something you listen.

Men are as faithful as their options.

There's a difference between racism and I don't know any better. I'm clueless. Racism is like, I'm trying to make you feel bad. That's racism.

So, to say Barack Obama is progress is saying that he's the first black person that is qualified to be president. That's not black progress. That's white progress.

I mean no disrespect to anything I did before.

Women need food, water, and compliments.
That's right.
And an occasional pair of shoes.

If a woman tells you she's twenty and looks sixteen, she's twelve. If she tells you she's twenty-six and looks twenty-six, she's damn near forty.

If a homeless person has a funny sign, he hasn't been homeless for that long. A real homeless person is too hungry to be funny.

You know the world's gone mad when the best rapper is a white guy, the best golfer is a black guy, the Swiss hold the America's Cup, France is accusing the USA of arrogance and the Germans don't want to go to war !

Black History Month is in the shortest month of the year, and the coldest-just in case we want to have a parade.

My dad worked every day. I didn't get into show business to work every day. So the fact that most days I get to like, spend really good time with my kids -- that's what success is to me.

I saw the yearbook picture. There was six of them! I ain't have six friends in high school, I don't have six friends now! That's three on three with a half court.

If poor people knew how rich rich people are, there would be riots in the streets.

When you have kids, there's no such thing as quality time. There's just time. There's no, 'Ooh, his graduation's better than going to the mall.' It's all kind of equal. Changing her diaper and her winning a contest -- it's all good.

I just thought everybody lived around abandoned buildings and crack-heads, ... I lived in the ghetto until I was like 19. I came to Los Angeles, stayed at hotels and stuff. When I got back and I saw what my neighborhood looked like, I started getting scared.

Daddy pays for the water, daddy pays for the gas, daddy pays for the electricity, and if daddy didn't pay for the electricity, he'd pay for the candle on your nightstand, so you can study for the big test tomorrow.

They don't want you to vote. If they did, we wouldn't vote on a Tuesday. In November. You ever throw a party on a Tuesday? No. Because nobody would come.

I'll go with the guy with one house. The guy with one house is scared about losing his house.

What the fuck do women want? I know what you want: everything.

There are only three things women need in life: food, water and compliments.

Gay people got a right to be as miserable as everybody else.

George Bush hates midgets.

Everyone has favorite criminals. Mine are pimps. We can all rob a bank; we can all sell drugs. Being a pimp is a whole other thing.

Kids always act up the most before they go to sleep.

Dude, I didn't say Jude Law can't act. I didn't say Jude Law was in bad movies. I just said he's in every movie.

Comedy is a group activity, a verbal orgy.

I live way below my means.

Sometimes people offer you plays, they offer you parts, but they only offer it because I'm famous.

By the time I was 7 or 8, I wanted to be a comedy writer.

I'm in show business... I want to hang out with Janet Jackson, not Jesse Jackson.

Welcome to the 77th and last Oscars.

When I started out in comedy, it was common knowledge that it took about 10 years to get good. And that was okay because it took you about 9 years to get on television.

I have no idea what my best material is. Different people like different things. I'll say this: The political stuff gets the press, but the relationship jokes sell all the seats.

I'd like to be in a Spike Jonze movie. But I live in a Nancy Meyers movie.

I kind of keep my personality in my pocket a lot. When I start to do stand-up, that's not my true personality either. It's the personality of a guy who hasn't been able to say what he wanted to say.

There's some downsides to being famous, which are not even worth mentioning. But to combat the bad sides of being famous, you really should take advantage of the good sides. The good sides are, you can use that fame to get projects you might not normally get.

I don't believe I can offend you in a comedy club. I don't believe I can offend you in a concert. A comedy club is a place where you work out material; you're trying material.

If I find a comedy club where no one's camera works, I'll go.

I realized with Broadway everything written for black people is usually written in the past, and I'm kind of a contemporary guy. I don't think you want to see me in 'Raisin in the Sun'.

Anything I say about women, I try to make sure that at least five or six friends of mine are going through a similar situation. That way I'm not picking on my wife.

America is the greatest country in the whole world.