You can’t be funny for funny’s sake. You try to get as outrageous situation as you can but it always has to be believable and based in real character motivations and what people would really do.

Azaria is articulating a core principle of character-based comedy: laughs are strongest when they arise from credible human behavior rather than from arbitrary “jokes.” Even in heightened or absurd scenarios, the audience needs to recognize authentic motives—fear, vanity, desire, insecurity—driving the action. The “outrageous” can go very far, he suggests, so long as it remains psychologically true to the character and to how people plausibly react under pressure. This view aligns with ensemble sitcom and voice-performance craft (including animation), where consistency of character logic sustains long-running humor and prevents comedy from feeling forced or merely performative.