Top 70 Josh Radnor Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “It’s not our job to play judge and jury, to determine who is worthy of our kindness and who is not. We just need to be kind, unconditionally and without ulterior motive, even – or rather, especially – when we’d prefer not to be.”

— Josh Radnor

2. “Talk about what you love and keep quiet about what you don’t.”

— Josh Radnor

3. “One of the secrets to life is saying yes to change and allowing things to transition, but I also think you have to mark the time and give thanks for all that it gave you.”

— Josh Radnor

4. “It really shocks me when I encounter people who think kindness doesn’t matter. Because I think it’s pretty much the only thing that matters.”

— Josh Radnor

5. “Knowing when to say something and when not to say something is important.”

— Josh Radnor

6. “The purpose of fiction is to combat loneliness.”

— Josh Radnor

7. “I kicked college nostalgia in my late 20s. As much as I loved college and treasure the memories, I no longer want to go back.”

— Josh Radnor

8. “Kindness is not about instant gratification. More often, it’s akin to a low-risk investment that appreciates steadily over time.”

— Josh Radnor

9. “I have really good female friends. I’ve never bought the whole men-and-women-can’t-be-friends thing. I think that’s sort of nonsense.”

— Josh Radnor

10. “I know not everyone starts out reading high literature. If you read enough you might be drawn to some other things, so maybe those vampire books are what they call ‘gateway books.’ I just coined that term. I don’t know if there’s a thing called ’gateway books.”

— Josh Radnor

11. “I haven’t left the house without a packet of Kleenex in my back pocket for as long as I can remember. Whenever I start thinking I’m incredibly cool, the packet of Kleenex in my back pocket brings me right back down to earth.”

— Josh Radnor

12. “The attitude of the director is really important, in terms of setting tone.”

— Josh Radnor

13. “When I’m working, it’s great. When I’m not working, it’s great.”

— Josh Radnor

14. “I think the word ‘earnest’ kind of has a negative connotation on some level. I think one of the things that’s happened is that being cynical is somehow conflated with being sophisticated. I think that’s problematic, to say the least.”

— Josh Radnor

15. “I don’t think evil people or negative people are inherently interesting all the time. People who are good people getting better at being themselves – to me, that’s something that’s really interesting to watch.”

— Josh Radnor

16. “Nobody feels like an adult. It is the world’s dirty secret.”

— Josh Radnor

17. “One man’s uplift is another man’s sentimental hooey.”

— Josh Radnor

18. “No matter how dark things may get in a story, I feel it’s the responsibility of the storyteller to leave the audience with at least a shred of hope.”

— Josh Radnor

19. “Well, I stopped drinking. That was actually a big deal. I didn’t go through any harrowing rock-bottom experience. I just made a decision to stop drinking.”

— Josh Radnor

20. “We’re like a gardener with a hose and our attention is water – we can water flowers or we can water weeds.”

— Josh Radnor

21. “Everyone has expectations. You just don’t want to have them dashed, so you’re quiet about them.”

— Josh Radnor

22. “I think a lot of Civil War stuff is written – As they say, history is written by the victors. And one of the things that I think is fascinating about this from a purely dramatic perspective is whether someone is right or wrong, you understand where they’re coming from in this.”

— Josh Radnor

23. “I’m not a masochistic reader. If something is just too dense or not enjoyable, even though I’m told it should be good for me, I’ll put it down. That said, most of what I read would be considered high-end or good for you, I suppose. But, I also think that reading should be enjoyable.”

— Josh Radnor

24. “As a person, I’m anti-violence.”

— Josh Radnor

25. “It’s really hard to be poor in New York – I was really poor when I lived in New York.”

— Josh Radnor

26. “I have great people surrounding me and helping me out. I’m totally in love with directing movies and I hope to do more of it.”

— Josh Radnor

27. “I like movies that are about real people in real time with real problems.”

— Josh Radnor

28. “A lot of times, we’re just sold these movies that are really cynically conceived and marketed, and they just want you there opening weekend, before everybody finds out it’s not so good.”

— Josh Radnor

29. “I learned to choose my battles. Sometimes I let my producer deal with something that I didn’t want to deal with.”

— Josh Radnor

30. “I’ll say this, and this has nothing to do with gender or sexuality: You do not want to get licked in the face repeatedly by another human being. You just don’t. It’s not pleasant.”

— Josh Radnor

31. “You know, I’m not saying, ‘Oh, because I play a good guy on TV, I need to suddenly be villainous in a movie.’ I look at it more like: does this role has a kind of urgency for me in terms of, ‘Can I not say no to it for whatever reason?’”

— Josh Radnor

32. “All of the things I used to obsess over, I’m no longer as obsessed with. I have new concerns but they’re a little more existential or cosmic.”

— Josh Radnor

33. “I really like to travel when I write. Something about seeing new things and being in new cultures and environments provokes new thoughts in your head.”

— Josh Radnor

34. “After a brief period in which I had let many a Southern Californian convince me that it was all ‘in my mind,’ I am once again officially allergic to dogs.”

— Josh Radnor

35. “I think that the mark of a great book is that it will meet you wherever you’re at and you’ll feel and experience something new and different each time you read it.”

— Josh Radnor

36. “Acting on stage is still my favorite thing to do. And everyone who’s been in musicals knows that there is nothing more fun.”

— Josh Radnor

37. “Sadness be gone, let’s be people who deserve to be loved, who are worthy, cause we are worthy.”

— Josh Radnor

38. “There are just things you can explore in a movie that you can’t in 22 minutes with a laugh track.”

— Josh Radnor

39. “I went through this very serious Woody Allen phase in college and a little bit after college. I still see his movies.”

— Josh Radnor

40. “To write a story about New York that only deals with people in your age and socioeconomic bracket, that feels dishonest to me. So much of New York comes from everyone bumping into each other.”

— Josh Radnor

41. “In writing scripts now, having made a film, I’m much more conscious of what it means to shoot and edit a movie, and that affects the writing.”

— Josh Radnor

42. “If I’m feeling something, I have a lot of different ways to express it, you know? I can write an article about it. I can write a screenplay about it. I can act in someone’s thing.”

— Josh Radnor

43. “I’ve always been attracted to ensembles. When I started doing plays in high school and in college, I always loved the community aspect of it. I loved these little families that would develop.”

— Josh Radnor

44. “When I write a film, there’s a particular thing I am wrestling with and the question or concern I’m dealing with has to be big enough for me to dedicate a year or two of my life. If the question isn’t big enough, or rich enough, I’ll lose interest.”

— Josh Radnor

45. “Here’s the problem: I don’t like who I’ve become when my iPhone is within reach. I find myself checking e-mails and responding to texts throughout the day with some kind of Pavlovian ferocity – it’s not a conscious act, but a reflexive one.”

— Josh Radnor

46. “I distinguish sentiment from sentimentality. Sentimentality makes your skin crawl. It’s like too much sugar. But, sentiment is a great feeling.”

— Josh Radnor

47. “I feel comfortable with women. I have two sisters, so I grew up in a female-dominated environment.”

— Josh Radnor

48. “I actually have a thing about proper nouns. They clang on my ear in a weird way when I hear them dropped into movies.”

— Josh Radnor

49. “We are so vocal about what we hate.”

— Josh Radnor

50. “I care about reading, a lot. It’s a big part of my life.”

— Josh Radnor