They didn't portray comic characters, they were comic characters.

There's going to be this juxtaposition of the comic strip characters you're never going to see again,

I was above all drawn to the opportunity to intimately portray female characters. Up until then my films revolved around male characters plunged into conflict and war,

I don't know where people got the idea that characters in books are supposed to be likable. Books are not in the business of creating merely likeable characters with whom you can have some simple identification with. Books are in the business of creating great stories that make you're brain go ahhbdgbdmerhbergurhbudgerbudbaaarr.

Comic characters have to have some kind of life breathed into them, and I'm never exactly sure how that's done, but you can tell when it works and when it doesn't. There's nothing worse than looking at a comic when somebody doesn't have that. It's like looking at store windows or something.

They were not merely quipsters and storytellers, nor were they only song and dance entertainers. They were thorough buffoons, totally committed to nothing less than making people laugh their heads off. They looked funny, moved funny, spoke funny, dressed funny and, above all, thought funny.