For as charming as Zach Galifianakis has been in the hundred or so movies he’s starred in these past two years (including this weekend’s Due Date), it’s hard not to wonder if his real talent is in giving interviews. Lucky for us, his many films have put him on a seemingly endless press tour lately, which has given him the opportunity to tell delightful jokes, anecdotes, and outright lies (and even blaze one on Friday’s Real Time With Bill Maher). To show our appreciation, we’ve put together a sampling Galifianakis’s one-(or more) liners, on the topics ranging from love to air-humping.
• On New York: “When I first moved here, I was from North Carolina — I’m still from North Carolina — and I was very scared, and when I would walk around in the city, in my neighborhood, I would purposefully drool, so nobody would mess with me … a defense mechanism. And then when I got to my door I would just wipe my chin, go inside, and watch a movie on Lifetime. Well, that’s when I didn’t have the beard, now, with the beard, you know, homeless people give me money.” [Letterman]
• On his New York apartment: “I lived in a crack house. They stopped being crack dealers about a year after I was there. All the artists started moving in. Fucking art. The last thing we need is art.” [Brian Palmer]
• On New York, now: “In the neighborhood I live in, I don’t have to bathe. And that’s nice.” [NY Mag]
• On trying to be an actor: “I was really desperate. I mean, I took a couple of acting classes, but I was laughing during them. They’re therapy sessions, most of these classes in New York. People were crying. It wasn’t for me.” [Boston Phoenix]
• On his personal fashion: “My style is community-college librarian.” [Vulture]
• On fashion shows: “Oh, I’d love to sit up front and boo them and yell things like ‘who gives a shit!?’ ” [Vulture]
• On fashion shows: “Oh, I’d love to sit up front and boo them and yell things like ‘who gives a shit!?’ ” [Vulture]
• On his personal fashion: “My style is community-college librarian.” [Vulture]
• On the others stealing his look: “Jesus. Rasputin. Bruce Valanche.” [Esquire]
• “Well, I have never been much of a groomer. I take baths a lot, but I don’t wear deodorant. I don’t have to. I have a miraculous body scent. I’ve had women smell me and say that should be bottled. I would advise guys to lay off the Drakkar, because the cavemen weren’t wearing it. They might have been putting mint leaves on their balls, but [your scent] is grown naturally. I have really good dating advice.” [Esquire]
• Best piece of romantic advice: “Make sure you’re heterosexual, if you are, and make sure you’re homosexual, if you are. Just, double-check … get a copy of Cosmo magazine.” [Youtube All Access]
• “What you do is take a fanny pack with a couple of beers with you to the bar. You tell the girl you’re gonna go get some drinks and come back two seconds later, and she’ll be like, “I didn’t want a Bud Light. I wanted a martini.”
[Esquire]
• “I’ve had a scene where I’m supposed to kiss somebody, and I went for it with the actress. It was a movie called Visioneers, with Mia Maestro. Google her. She’s really nice. She was not going for it. I think a couple of takes I went in with my tongue already out of my mouth. It was like a plane coming in for a landing. And then it was as if someone had cemented her mouth shut.” [GQ]
• On fashion shows: “Oh, I’d love to sit up front and boo them and yell things like ‘who gives a shit!?’ ” [Vulture]
• On how he achieved being so good looking: “I mowed lawns. I got plastic surgery when I was 7. I had a double chin when I was 4 that I got removed. And my mom entered me — in North Carolina there was a stupid reality show called Who Wants to Look Like the Governor? — so I entered that and got my face altered to look like the governor. I had a stage mom type thing.” [Brian Palmer]
