Long, long before Freud, the Jews had this saying: “When a son gets married, he divorces his mother.

Jews have received their tempering from an unflinching realism learned for a high fee in the school of life; they have always felt the need of fortifying their spirits with the armor of laughter against the barbs of the world.

You have Mel Brooks and your Marx Brothers and your Larry David. So it's affected it enormously and really not at all. I don't think I've ever done anything comedically where the joke of it had to do with Judaism and Jewishness, but there's definitely a proud tradition of comedy in the Jews.

First you laugh at a Jewish joke or quip. Then, against your will, you suddenly fall silent and thoughtful. And that is because Jews are so frequently jesting philosophers. A hard life has made them realists, realists without illusion.