Stephen Glenn Martin
2008 Tribeca Film Festival, photo by David Shankbone (23 April 2008)
Born: 14 April 1945, Waco, Texas
Martin was raised at Inglewood and Garden Grove, California and had a difficult and distant relationship with his father. His first job was selling guidebooks at Disneyland and he started working on magic tricks, juggling, and creating balloon animals. He started working on comedy routines while at Santa Ana Junior College, joining a comedy troupe at Knott's Berry Farm. A girlfriend who was a dancer on the show got him a job as a writer for the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, he also wrote for The Glen Campbell Good time Hour and The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour. Martin did stand-up comedy opening for concerts and appeared often on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson and The Gong Show. He was "A Wild and Crazy Guy" and a star Jerk in a movie of that name, but over time his work in fifty films became more serious and varied. Roxanne, his interpretation of Cyrano, was well received. He was the most-frequent host of Saturday Night Live, but never was part of the cast. He had played the banjo as an element of his comedy, but won a Best Country Instrumental Performance Grammy for "Foggy Mountain Breakdown", recorded with Earl Scruggs in 2002 and accompanied James Taylor at Carnegie Hall on 12 April 2011. He is a significant art collector and recently wrote a novel, An Object of Beauty, set in the Manhattan gallery scene, he had written two previous novels and two volumes of short stories. He remains capable of humor and surprise, guests at his 2007 wedding to writer Anne Stingfield had been invited to a party and were surprised when former Nebraska Senator Bob Kerrey presided over the ceremony.
Biography from Wikipedia and National Public Radio
Additional quotes from Wikiquote. Wikiquote entries are often "sourced" and may include items longer than those included here, particularly for poets, lyricists, and dramatists.
Steve Martin quotes:
Quotes found : 67 — (15 per page, this is page 1 of 5) 1 2 3 4 5 Next
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- A celebrity is any well-known TV or movie star who looks like he spends more than two hours working on his hair. permalink
Steve Martin - A day without sunshine is like, you know, night. permalink
Steve Martin - A kiss may not be the truth, but it is what we wish were true. permalink
Steve Martin - L. A. Story (1991) - All I've ever wanted was an honest week's pay for an honest day's work. permalink
Steve Martin - Art as an aesthetic principle was supported by thousands of years of discernment and psychic rewards, but art as a commodity was held up by air. The loss of confidence that affected banks and financial instruments was not affecting cherubs, cupids and flattened popes. The objects hadn't changed: what was there before was there after. But a vacancy was created with the clamoring crowds deserted and retrenched. permalink
Steve Martin - An Object of Beauty (2010) - Chaos in the midst of chaos isn't funny, but chaos in the midst of order is. permalink
Steve Martin - Comedy is not pretty. permalink
Steve Martin - Comedy is Not Pretty album (1979) - Despite a lack of natural ability, I did have the one element necessary to all early creativity: naivete, that fabulous quality that keeps you from knowing just how unsuited you are for what you are about to do. permalink
Steve Martin - Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life (2007) - First the doctor told me the good news: I was going to have a disease named after me. permalink
Steve Martin - He doesn't understand the subtleties of slights and pains, that it is not the big events that hurt the most but rather the smallest questionable shift in tone at the end of a spoken word that can plow most deeply into the heart. permalink
Steve Martin - Shopgirl (2000) - He gave her his phone number, in a peculiar reversal of dating procedure. She might have considered kissing him, even after the horrible first date, but he just didn't seem to know what to do. However, Jeremy does have one outstanding quality. He likes her. And this quality in a person makes them infinitely interesting to the person who is being liked. permalink
Steve Martin - Shopgirl (2000) - How is it possible to miss a woman whom you kept at a distance, so that when she was gone you would not miss her? permalink
Steve Martin - Shopgirl (2000) - I actually learned about sex watching neighborhood dogs. And it was good. Go ahead and laugh. I think the most important thing I learned was: Never let go of the girl's leg, no matter how hard she tries to shake you off. permalink
Steve Martin - I believe entertainment can aspire to be art, and can become art, but if you set out to make art you're an idiot. permalink
Steve Martin - I believe in equality. Equality for everybody. No matter how stupid they are or how superior I am to them. permalink
Steve Martin
Quotes found : 67 — (15 per page, this is page 1 of 5) 1 2 3 4 5 Next
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