Top 60 Ben Stiller Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “What the hell am I doing with my life?”

— Ben Stiller

Featured in: Depressing Quotes

2. “Moisture is the essence of wetness, and wetness is the essence of beauty.”

— Ben Stiller

3. “God was showing off when he made you.”

— Ben Stiller

4. “Success doesn’t necessarily mean happiness.”

— Ben Stiller

5. “I’m pretty sure there’s a lot more to life than being really, really, ridiculously good looking. And I plan on finding out what that is.”

— Ben Stiller

6. “Words can only hurt you if you try to read them. Don’t play their game!”

— Ben Stiller

7. “I love New York. I was sad, depressed and incredibly moved by our fellow countrymen and what they’ve done. I wanted to give people a chance to see something funny, have a distraction.”

— Ben Stiller

Featured in: Quotes About New York

8. “I’d love to travel more. I really look forward to traveling with my kids. I’m just waiting for them to want to travel with me.”

— Ben Stiller

9. “I think this whole celebrity world is weird anyway. Weird and funny and kind of pathetic and yet so right for parody.”

— Ben Stiller

10. “I don’t need a compass to tell me which way the wind shines !”

— Ben Stiller

11. “I have not been an easygoing guy. I think it’s called bipolar manic depression. I’ve got a rich history of that in my family.”

— Ben Stiller

12. “Nobody makes me bleed my own blood. Nobody!”

— Ben Stiller

13. “I love history. I’m very interested by it and I think it’s great to have a movie that brings it alive in a way. It’s sort of that romanticized version of it.”

— Ben Stiller

14. “Oh, you can milk just about anything with nipples.”

— Ben Stiller

15. “I studied Tom Cruise running in all the Mission Impossibles. I think he’s one of the best screen runners.”

— Ben Stiller

16. “You have to stay in character in between takes.”

— Ben Stiller

17. “I’ve been to Japan but I’ve never been to China, I’d love to go to China. I don’t know, I like to go to places that are remote. So, I think I’d like to do that more. And just sort of also explore not having a structured work life someday, to have more free time to sort of see what happens.”

— Ben Stiller

18. “I have a lot of nervous energy. Work is my best way of channelling that into something productive unless I want to wind up assaulting the postman or gardener.”

— Ben Stiller

19. “I was a bad student. I liked archaeology actually, I was interested in maybe becoming an archaeologist but I was such a bad student and had such bad grades that I wasn’t going to get into any really good college so I fell back on acting.”

— Ben Stiller

20. “Sometimes I wondered whether I hadn’t let my career get confined to one direction, but lately I’ve decided to accept the fact that I have this opportunity to be successful doing comedies.”

— Ben Stiller

21. “When we were visiting New York City, I took my kids to the same playground where I went growing up. It was fun to feel that connection of having gone there as a kid and being there as a parent.”

— Ben Stiller

22. “I’m just not a naturally cheery person. I’m naturally moody. I know that from people who spend a lot of time with me. People who spend a lot of time with me may not wish to spend a lot more time with me.”

— Ben Stiller

23. “I don’t play hockey at all. I’m not comfortable on skates.”

— Ben Stiller

24. “I don’t think know if anything’s going to translate anywhere. You’re making a movie, you hope it’s going to be funny, you can’t think about how it’s going to go over.”

— Ben Stiller

25. “There’s an old saying in Hollywood: It’s not the length of your film, it’s how you use it.”

— Ben Stiller

26. “I don’t think it’s ever easy to be funny. I find it easy to amuse myself with a certain sort of cynical dark humor that tends toward the meaner side, like my character in Happy Gilmore. Those kinds of characters come easily to me.”

— Ben Stiller

27. “Zoolander was more of my own sensibility.”

— Ben Stiller

28. “There’s always an element of fear that you need to work a lot until people get sick and tired of you or finally figure out that you’re a fraud after all!”

— Ben Stiller

29. “My parents used to throw great New Year’s Eve parties. They invited such an eclectic mix of showbiz people. All those cool people were always hanging out at our apartment.”

— Ben Stiller

30. “You’re freaked out that you’re going to be having a child, and once you’re looking after your daughter, it’s the most beautiful thing in the world.”

— Ben Stiller

31. “If you look at my eyes when I’m dancing, you’ll see that glazed look.”

— Ben Stiller

32. “I’m not an expert on the Malaysian sense of humor.”

— Ben Stiller

33. “As a kid I had dreams about being successful, thinking it would be cool. Then, when I was in my 20s, I really thought I had it much more figured out than I do now.”

— Ben Stiller

34. “I don’t even want to think of myself as an actor because it’s such an insecure place to go.”

— Ben Stiller

35. “I think most politicians could take a dodgeball in the face.”

— Ben Stiller

36. “I think you never want to have to go into the scene having to improvise; you want to make sure its working on the page. But I do like to have the ability to try stuff just in the moment, to give it some sort of spontaneity.”

— Ben Stiller

37. “It’s weird that people expect me to be funny. I find it a real burden when I’m expected to be humorous on talk shows.”

— Ben Stiller

38. “I wanted to be funny for people who didn’t care about fashion at all, to just to kind of exist as a silly character.”

— Ben Stiller

39. “It’s great to work with the people who make you laugh and who are funnier than I am.”

— Ben Stiller

40. “It’s what I wanted to do with my life. Not necessarily just direct Jim Carrey movies, but to direct and act and write and create and along the way discover what it is that I’m about.”

— Ben Stiller

41. “I don’t devalue comedy as compared to drama. Not one bit.”

— Ben Stiller

42. “Jim Carrey, a comic genius, has a harder time overcoming the public’s desire for him to be funny simply because he’s so good at it.”

— Ben Stiller

43. “I enjoy the work I do in comedies. It’s a valid test of your creative abilities.”

— Ben Stiller

44. “My own parents were touchy-feely.”

— Ben Stiller

45. “Maybe forced retirement isn’t necessary after all.”

— Ben Stiller

46. “I don’t know what that weid fantasy is that makes people go, “Oh, you must have had a great childhood.””

— Ben Stiller

47. “I think people will be curious to see what I can do as a dramatic actor.”

— Ben Stiller

48. “I’m very interested in the early American history, the time when the country came together.”

— Ben Stiller

49. “It was a mixed blessing to have famous parents. It was tough to go to auditions and be bad, since I couldn’t be anonymous.”

— Ben Stiller

50. “Whatever talent I had, I’m sure it helped that my parents were in the business and that I grew up around actors, comedians and directors.”

— Ben Stiller