American actor & stand-up comic (1953- )
Now the denominator ... why don't they just call it the bottom number? The denominator ... that sounds like a Schwarzenegger movie doesn't it? [impersonating Arnold Schwarzenegger] I am the Denominator. I'll give your leg a compound fraction.
TIM ALLEN
Home Improvement
Men look at women the way men look at cars. Everyone looks at Ferraris. Now and then we like a pickup truck, and we all end up with station wagons.
TIM ALLEN
Don't Stand Too Close to a Naked Man
I have irrational fears, and they all go back to losing my father as a kid. I've never gotten over it. One day my father was there, the next he wasn't, and there was no going back. There's no "I'll be better, God. Now I know I shouldn't eat candy." As children, your world is yours. That day taught me that it's really not your world. Somebody else is in control -- fate, God, whatever it is. It is not your show. And the show can be brutal. Brutal in its coldness. Brutal in its love and affection. Shit can hit you straight between the eyes and you never saw it coming, even when you were looking straight ahead.
TIM ALLEN
Esquire, Nov. 2011
Women now have choices. They can be married, not married, have a job, not have a job, be married with children, unmarried with children. Men have the same choice we've always had: work or prison.
TIM ALLEN
attributed, The Mammoth Book of Comic Quotes
Being wealthy when no one else is is like being the only one at the party with a drink.
TIM ALLEN
Esquire, Nov. 2011
When you're 6 or 7, your father becomes this wonderful presence in your life. I really responded to my father. And then, the very moment I realized that I loved him unconditionally, that life was going to be great just because he was in it, he was gone.
TIM ALLEN
Parade Magazine, Oct. 27, 2002
I'm a pretty solid Christian. But even as an altar boy, I was always asking the bigger questions--you know: if God is, in fact, good, what is all this death I see? And if God is gentle, what is all this suffering I see? I've found some of the answers in Eastern religion. It explained my Christianity to me. Good and evil are the same thing. You can't have one without the other. It's the balance, it's the temperance of things.
TIM ALLEN
attributed, Mr. Showbiz, 1996
Home Improvement was going to be two stars in a lovely adult romance. It turned out to be this show about the ape-man who blows up shit.
TIM ALLEN
attributed, Mr. Showbiz, 1996
Sometimes you get the sense that the Creator is getting to that point of "Yeah, we might have to reboot."
TIM ALLEN
Esquire, Nov. 2011
Can a woodchuck chuck wood? Because the question is, "how much wood could a woodchuck chuck if," so you haven't established or proved without any shadow of a doubt that a woodchuck could chuck wood. Frankly, I believe that they chew wood. I don't think they can chuck wood at all! I take offense to the whole chucking question.
TIM ALLEN
Laugh Factory Magazine, 1994
The unfairness of life is indicative of trees. I planted twenty trees on the same block. It's so fucking weird. Six became huge. One is giant. And there are some little shitty ones. Same soil. Same water. Same seed. But those little ones just don't grow. I can't explain it.
TIM ALLEN
Esquire, Nov. 2011
If you want to condemn yourself for the mistakes you've made, let's be fair, that means you've got to congratulate yourself for all the good things you've done. It's okay to say, "God, I wish I'd done this; yeah, but I did do that." Then it kind of balances out.
TIM ALLEN
Reader's Digest, Oct. 2001
Real men don't use instructions, son. Besides, this is just the manufacturer's opinion on how to put this together.
TIM ALLEN
Home Improvement
Men aren't allowed to have self-esteem, because we're already supposed to have all the power.... But most men earn less than they want, barely the minimum wage. They're drones. They do stuff they don't want to do to support their families, and they're not sure why they do it. They don't know what they're doing half the time, and any time we stick up for ourselves, we're pigs because we don't know how to articulate our frustrations and joys.
TIM ALLEN
Parade Magazine, Oct. 27, 2002
Man is the only animal to borrow tools.
TIM ALLEN
attributed, Natural History, Apr. 1994
Unlike me, Tim Taylor isn't burdened with thoughts about the cosmos. He thinks the Cosmos are a soccer team.
TIM ALLEN
I'm Not Really Here
The greatest missile in the world is useless ... unless it's targeted. A torpedo is adrift unless it has someplace to go. An arrow is pointless unless it hits something. So it's important for kids--for everyone, even if you fail at first--to target something and head in that direction. With all your might.
TIM ALLEN
Don't Stand Too Close to a Naked Man
The world is your oyster when you are successful. That was when I was getting scripts. I was planning for this. I like this business. Parts of it I love, and I didn't want it to just end. The further you get away from your success, the less your phone rings. The next thing you know, it's 20 years later and you're in a mall going, "Remember when Al and I used to do something like this..."
TIM ALLEN
Valley Magazine, Jan/Feb, 2000
I think there's a percentage [of the audience] that don't realize, that don't know that [standup] is how everything began. We planned it, we work hard, rehearsals to get this. It's more of a ... it's not just coming in there in a T-shirt and holding a microphone.
TIM ALLEN
Tampa Bay Times, Jul. 25, 2013
I look at it this way: How much of the day are you awake? You think, "I've gotta get that dry cleaning, I gotta get this going, and this, and this, and this." And all of a sudden it's dinnertime. And then there's a moment of connection with your spouse or your friends. Then you read and go to bed. Wake up and then it's the same all over. You're not awake, you're not living, you're not experiencing. We start early medicating ourselves. We start kids early, on TV and video games and so on.
TIM ALLEN
Reader's Digest, Oct. 2001