Don Rickles: What do you fear most?

The question

Originally asked

Vanity Fair, to its interview subject, The Proust Questionnaire

The exact prompt is fixed in Vanity Fair's Proust Questionnaire and independently sustained in The Guardian's The Q&A over multiple decades.

You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.

Don Rickles

Recorded said elsewhere, not written here

My greatest fear is going out onstage and having the audience just stare at me.

Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, April 2017 source ↗

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Justin Hawkins

Fear is for frightened people. I’m not one of those.

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 1 March 2025 source ↗

Hamza Yassin

Heights, and not getting along with people.

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 30 September 2023 source ↗

Warren Buffett Chairman and chief executive of Berkshire Hathaway, 1970–2025

And now, you've got nine countries, including, you know, a guy in North Korea. I mean, and there will be, something will happen. And we worried enormously about it when there were two. And we had perfectly, we had really pretty sane leaders in Kennedy and Khrushchev. You know, I mean, you were not dealing with unstable people or anything like that.

Recorded Becky Quick, CNBC “Squawk Box”, recorded in Omaha; CNBC's own transcript of its own broadcast, 31 March 2026 source ↗

Laurie Metcalf

Anything underneath me in water I can’t see to the bottom of.

Recorded Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, February 2018 source ↗

More from Don Rickles

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Question Who alive today do you admire most, and what draws you to them? Values & belief

Well, Frank Sinatra’s gone, so the rest have to stand in line.

Recorded Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, April 2017 source ↗

Question What trait do you most dislike in other people? Values & belief

Trying too hard to be funny.

Recorded Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, April 2017 source ↗

Question What does happiness look like for you when life is going well? Identity & self

Perfect happiness is having a wife who loves you and doesn’t ask for too much jewelry.

Recorded The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, 1 April 2003 source ↗

Question Which trait in yourself do you like least? Identity & self

Having no patience.

Recorded Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, April 2017 source ↗

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