Martin Short Documentary ‘Marty, Life Is Short’ Contends For Emmys

Actor Martin Short can go small, as in the movie Clifford, where he played a mischievous 10-year-old. Or he can go big, in a fat suit as Jiminy Glick, the portly entertainment journalist with the outsized appetite and outsized laugh. In fact, Short can do just about anything: sing, dance, sketch comedy, dramatic roles.

“You can’t learn that,” insists his friend, filmmaker Lawrence Kasdan. “You’re sort of born with it, like athletic skill, really… And he’s that way with entertainment. He was born with all the right things.”

Kasdan, the four-time Oscar-nominated writer-director known for The Big Chill, Silverado, Wyatt Earp, The Accidental Tourist and more makes a foray into nonfiction filmmaking with Marty, Life Is Short, his portrait of the artist who at age 76 has become more popular than ever. Kasdan and Short have been pals for 40 years.

“I wanted people to know what it’s like to hang around with this guy,” the director says of the Emmy-contending Netflix film. “I know a lot of entertaining comedians and actors. They’re a ball to be around, but not forever. But with Marty you could really say, ‘Will you take a 500-mile car trip with this guy?” and you say, ‘Yeah.’ That’s what he’s like. And there aren’t a lot of people in showbusiness you would say that about.”

They first met when Kasdan was producing the 1987 romantic comedy Cross My Heart. Kasdan wanted Short for the male lead.

“I went to see him and talk him into it, and we just hit it off,” Kasdan recalls. “The making of [Cross My Heart] was a little difficult… I think it maybe bonded us a little bit because it was a tough situation… I really just liked hanging around with him. And to this day, he’s just incredibly incisive about things and there’s nothing soft-boiled about him and yet there’s a kindness to him. That’s what sort of drew me.”

The film explores Short’s upbringing in Hamilton, Ontario as the youngest of five children. He gravitated early towards performing and found a readymade and receptive audience in his older siblings and parents. By his teens he could do a spot-on rendition of Frank Sinatra’s vocals. In his early 20s, he landed a part in the 1972 Toronto production of Godspell that also featured future stars Eugene Levy, Dave Thomas, Andrea Martin, Victor Garber, and Gilda Radner (Short and Radner would become romantically involved for a time).

Short first came to wider public attention on SCTV, where I must say he introduced his Ed Grimley character (another knockout SCTV sketch, “The Battle of the PBS Stars,” pitted Short as Fred Rogers in a boxing match with John Candy’s Julia Child). In the mid-1980s he joined the cast of Saturday Night Live, but only spent a year there, finding the grind not to his taste.

Short appeared destined for movie stardom. Along with Cross My Heart in 1987, there was Innerspace the same year, and a year earlier ¡Three Amigos! in which he co-starred with Steve Martin and Chevy Chase. But none of those films hit big with audiences, although the latter two have steadily gained fans over time. Through professional ups and downs, Short has maintained remarkable equanimity.

“I would say my career has been 80 percent failure,” Short self-assesses in the documentary. “And I think those are pretty good odds.”

Kasdan marvels at Short’s response to setbacks. “The key word to me is resilience,” he notes. “I think that’s the key to all careers because inevitably you’re going to be disappointed, you’re going to have flops, but how resilient are you? How quickly do you get back up? And people like to say, ‘Oh, I always get back.’ But they don’t. People don’t always get back up, and you can take it one way or another, and you can be more or less damaged by criticism. And Marty just seems to have this resilience that’s unbelievable. And you see it in his personal life, of course.”

His personal life has been marked by wrenching loss. When he was 12, his eldest brother David was killed in a car crash. His mother died of cancer when Short was 18; his father passed away two years later. His wife, the singer-actress Nancy Dolman, died of ovarian cancer at the age of 58. Earlier this year, Short’s daughter Katherine took her own life at the age of 42. Marty, Life Is Short contains a lot of joy and humor, and not a little heartbreak.

“I’m glad that people react emotionally to it because it is emotional material and he’s a good guy, so you’re really invested in him,” Kasdan observes. “The thing that amazed me about him, that made me do this, was that spirit that goes through anything. So, it just got more and more poignant as the making of the film went on.”

The documentary is dedicated to Short’s daughter Katherine and to another Catherine – Catherine O’Hara – Short’s late friend and SCTV co-star. O’Hara is one of the many in Short’s circle who appear in the film — marquee names like Steven Spielberg and Kate Capshaw, Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell, Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, Eugene Levy, Andrea Martin, Paul Shaffer, John Mulaney, and Steve Martin.

Short, in the guise of Jiminy Glick, has interviewed some of his buddies. The rotund talk show host, chronically ill-prepared for interviews with his celebrity guests, provides an ample vessel for Short’s brilliant wit.

“He does it [instantaneously],” Kasdan says of Jiminy’s hilarious putdowns of the likes of Larry David, Mel Brooks, Bill Hader, Billy Crystal, Kevin Hart, and Steve Martin. (In his sit-down with Steven Spielberg, the director asks Jiminy which of his movies he’s liked the best. “I liked this film you did, Schindler’s Express, with Goldie Hawn. I’ve never seen Goldie better.” Spielberg: “Schindler’s List was with Liam Neeson.” Jiminy insists, “This was with Goldie Hawn.” Spielberg adds helpfully, “Sugarland Express. That’s what Goldie did. That was my first feature film.” Jiminy: “I think you’re wrong here. You’re gonna feel badly later. But I accept your apology.”).

Kasdan observes, “Anyone who sees Jiminy marvels at the speed of [his retorts] because he doesn’t know what [his guests] are going to say. He doesn’t know whether they’re going to set him up or not.”

Marty, Life Is Short competes for Emmy recognition in the documentary categories, while Short himself is poised to earn yet another Emmy nomination for his role as Oliver Putnam in Only Murders in the Building, the Hulu series that co-stars Steve Martin and Selena Gomez. ¡Three Amigos! 40 years ago might not have taken off as intended, but these three amigos have captivated audiences since their series debuted in 2021. For someone who has patiently weathered the vicissitudes of the business, the show has lifted Short to a new level of success.

“He hasn’t changed. That’s the amazing part. It’s like it took 50 years for people to get him,” Kasdan comments. “His audience has gotten bigger… Over time he’s just aged so well.”

The director adds, “I love seeing his audience expand. He exploded in recent years, but the natural ascension was always there.”