Steve Martin names the eight greatest movies of his career
It’s probably due to his shock of white hair, but comedian Steve Martin has essentially never looked any different for the past 50 years.
Ever since he stepped onto America’s screens in the mid-1970s as a stand-up comic and banjo player, Martin has been an ever-present in TV shows and movies, including some genuine all-time classics.
This Texan-born icon started out as an amateur magician before landing a writing job on a TV show in 1969, for which, alongside the other writers, he landed an Emmy at just 23. For around the next five years, he would write and perform in clubs before he began to appear on network shows like The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, The Muppet Show, and crucially, Saturday Night Live, where he was one of the most successful hosts.
It kicked off a massively successful period of his career as he went from releasing million-selling live comedy albums to the big screen, starting off with 1979’s The Jerk, a movie that cost just $4million to make but brought in well over $100m at the box office.
It has since gone down as one of the funniest movies of all time, acting as a definite precursor to the likes of the Farrelly Brothers’ movies of the 1990s, such as Dumb and Dumber and Kingpin.
The Jerk pushed Martin even further into the limelight, and he made more comedy hits, including Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid in 1982 and The Man with Two Brains a year later. But neither of those films earns a place on Martin’s pick of his own movies, which he outlined to the Los Angeles Times.
When asked which titles from his career stood out the most, he revealed, “Oh, I’d say Father of the Bride, Planes, Trains and Automobiles, Roxanne. I like Bowfinger. The Jerk. I love all the movies I made with Frank Oz—Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Little Shop [of Horrors] and Housesitter.“
Two of those films, Planes, Trains and Automobiles and Little Shop of Horrors, have gone down as all-time comedy greats, along with other movies that Martin made during a golden period between the late 1980s and early ‘90s, including the acclaimed LA Story and the chaotic family comedy Parenthood.
The latter was directed by Ron Howard and saw the actor team up with Rick Moranis, who was riding high from the success of Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. But when speaking about LA Story, Martin isn’t quite certain he nailed it, saying, “It’s very personal. It’s not story-driven. It’s funny… I wanted it to be magical, and I’m just not sure if I achieved that. But the city is better. When I left in the ’70s, the sky was green. The traffic hasn’t changed. But at least the sky is clear now.”
The comic continued his success streak through the early 2000s, appearing in hit movies like Cheaper by the Dozen and picking up an Emmy nomination for his guest star role in 30 Rock, before he took a backseat for the majority of the 2010s.
Most recently, Martin found a whole new audience with the success of the Disney+ whodunnit, Only Murders in the Building, along with Selena Gomez and long-time collaborator Martin Short. With a fifth season about to hit screens, the show has been widely acclaimed by critics and audiences alike. While the actor has highlighted his intention to retire from the industry once the show comes to a close, one thing is for sure: he has made quite an impression.
The eight best Steve Martin movies:
- Father of the Bride (Charles Shyer, 1991)
- Planes, Trains and Automobiles (John Hughes, 1987)
- Roxanne (Fred Schepisi, 1987)
- Bowfinger (Frank Oz, 1999)
- The Jerk (Carl Reiner, 1979)
- Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (Frank Oz, 1988)
- Little Shop of Horrors (Shawn Levy, 2003)
- Housesitter (Frank Oz, 1992)
