Ted Danson: What I've Learned

A friend is someone who will allow me to be a really bad friend and not hold it against me.

Comedy has to be rooted in sadness or it's worthless to me. Sam Malone, the alcoholic ...

My lessons didn't come at my father's knee. Like all good lessons, they were learned from example.

I grew up in Flagstaff, Arizona, without a television or any connection with pop culture. My father was a director of a museum and research center. Many of my friends were Hopi kids, which meant I'd go to their villages and mesas. They'd pray and dance to their gods the way they'd been doing for hundreds of years. So I was blessed with tolerance.

Courage is something I don't know how much I have. You can't plan for it. You either do the right thing or you don't when the moment comes.

If you've got integrity, it will smack you very hard when you fuck up.

If you don't have integrity, you'll go on for a very long time beating the crap out of people, robbing, stealing — and there's nothing inside you that tells you what you're doing is wrong. Life won't even bother to slap you.

To grow up knowing you're loved is astounding. It's a huge gift to a child.

The only reason to be a celebrity is you get to meet interesting people.

The secret to our marriage? We laugh a lot.

Your kid turning sixteen is a reason for prayer. As a parent, they're out of your control. You never had control anyway. But now it's really clear that you need to pray — because that's all you've got.

A good script is one that doesn't let you go, "I get it!" on page 5.

Anything great can be used as a weapon.

When you're not in love and you've just had sex, then it's kind of like, "Well, what's next?"

Look, no one gets out of this alive. That's not the game plan. We all die. So nobody's going to get an award for saving the planet and get to live forever. Okay, then, let's engage the problems with a joyous and hopeful heart. Because it doesn't matter if we blow it. It's not like this is a desperate game where if we win, we won't die. We all die.

Can I have as many guests as I'd like? Okay. Three. Jesus of Nazareth. Muhammad. And Buddha. We'd have some grape leaves — something simple and easy to digest. A little green tea. I'd say, "Fellas, let's talk ..."