"The comedians all finished their acts with a song. They would get a certain amount of money from the song publishers and would use that money to pay the writers. None of them paid very much for their comedy material, but it all added up."

"There's an unseen force which lets birds know when you've just washed your car."

"Frank liked administrative work and was good at it."

"If the laughter of the audience was malicious we wouldn't show it."

"Then after that came word processors and it's hard to make those laugh."

"It's like your children talking about holidays, you find they have a quite different memory of it from you. Perhaps everything is not how it is, but how it's remembered."

"I used to like writing for comedians - I enjoyed the challenge of making other people funny."

"And if you can offer an explanation as to why it doesn't work then you've got to the whole root of comedy."

"I defy anyone to get a decision that quickly these days."

"And when you're on your own there is that terrifying possibility that you may be the only person on the planet who thinks it's funny - and you have no way of finding out."