Is Martin Short the Greatest Talk-Show Guest of All Time?
The persona he has settled into is that of a self-assured but ever so slightly bitter show-business insider, a breezy phony, a Hollywood jerk. He walks onstage wearing a little smirk, and then makes a show of basking in the applause of the audience. He repeatedly refers to the “Daytime Oscars” he’s won, and makes passive-aggressive jokes about the fact that the show didn’t send a car for him, or about the cash bars that his rich Hollywood friends have at their parties. Sometimes he channels the louche vibe of a lesser Rat Packer. Other times, he drifts off into a Norma Desmond, faded-grande-dame kind of thing. He often seems to be doing two or three impressions at once. He likes to open his appearances with a series of rim-shot jokes made at the expense of the host, in the style of Don Rickles. “You look sensational,” he tells Letterman. “Is it the kale enemas?” To Jimmy Kimmel: “Every time I’m in your company, I’m whelmed.” To Conan O’Brien: “You look like the film negative of ‘Django Unchained.’ ” To Jimmy Fallon: “I bet you’re the only late-night host that goes to a pediatrician.”
Nice little piece from The New Yorker. I looked up the incident where Kathie Lee Gifford asked him about how he kept the spark alive in his marriage -- two years after his wife had passed! Man, he's a pro.
Is Short the greatest talk show guest? Maybe. He's definitely up there with Norm MacDonald, Will Ferrell, Jeff Goldblum, Bob Uecker, Don Rickles and Tony Randall. I'm probably missing some obvious ones.