10. “If acting was hard for me, I wouldn’t do it; it is something that I like to do”

Status: No evidence of George Carlin ever saying this:

“If acting was hard for me, I wouldn’t do it; it is something that I like to do”

This is another one of those quotations on the internet that I’ve seen a lot, but I can’t find the quote in any of his albums, books, or HBO specials. It sounds like something that may have come from an interview, but I haven’t been able to find an exact source. As usual, the source is never, ever given along with the quote.

Another reason why I’m a little skeptical of the authenticity of this quote is that although Carlin has done plenty of acting over the years, he often criticized the nature of acting in general. He has stated many times that his original plan was to be a comedic actor, like Danny Kaye, but found out rather fast that he didn’t like the restrictiveness of movie shooting. During the Q & A session of the Unmasked with George Carlin interview for XM radio, he says, “I wasn’t really born to be an actor. If I had trained all my life, it would have been a different story. If I had learned technique and training, yes, but I didn’t have the tools.”