Martin Short is in this year’s Emmy race through three projects at once: Only Murders in the Building, Match Game and Marty, Life Is Short. That kind of overlap is rare even before you factor in that the documentary tied to his life earned three nominations of its own, including a category Short cannot personally collect if it wins.
Only Murders in the Building put Short in the comedy lead field and also in line as an executive producer, while Match Game brought him in as a game show host. Marty, Life Is Short added the wrinkle: it centers on him, but he is not part of the production team, so the Emmy would go to the people behind it, not to Short himself.
Only Murders in the Building and Match Game
Short said the documentary call came after a long working relationship with Lawrence Kasdan, who phoned and said that he and Ron Howard and Imagine would love to do the project. Short said he had known Kasdan for 40 years, and his first reaction was cautious because, as he put it, “I’ve written a book, I’m Canadian, we’re a little more reserved, let me think about it.”
Short also described the home-video archive that fed the film. “Through all these years, I’ve always had a camcorder,” he said. “With all my kids, I would just film. And I’d have them transferred to DVD.” He added that John Candy pushed him toward that habit, recalling: “In 1981, I got a VHS machine, and I went, ‘what am I doing? John has Betamax. We can’t exchange movies! So I went back and traded my VHS for Beta. You don’t even want to know my LaserDisc collection.’”
Marty, Life Is Short and Katherine
Kasdan also told Short that Netflix could hold back the documentary’s release after Katherine died in February if he was not comfortable with it. Short said he told them to proceed. “We met at his home a few weeks after, and he said, ‘Netflix will do whatever you want and I will do whatever you want,’” Short said. “And I thought, this really could be called ‘Love, Loss and Survival.’ As I’ve said in the past, my daughter had mental health struggles. And it’s a disease. Some diseases are terminal, whether they’re cancer or mental health. And so, I said, ‘I think we should proceed.’ And he said, ‘I think we should too.’”
The film premiered globally in May, and Short said he has heard from many people since then. That response gives Marty, Life Is Short a different kind of awards-season presence: it is not just another title in the category, but a project built around Short’s own archive, grief and public image, while the actual Emmy eligibility for the documentary sits with the producers rather than the subject.
Three Emmy nominations
Marty, Life Is Short scored three Emmy nominations this year, and John Candy: I Like Me is competing against it in the documentary or nonfiction special category. Short said there are no future seasons in the works for him on Match Game, which makes that nomination read as a snapshot of where his hosting work landed rather than a sign of a continuing run.
For Short, the cleanest reading is also the sharpest one: he is all over the Emmy race, but not in the same way on every project. He can compete personally for Only Murders in the Building and Match Game, while Marty, Life Is Short gives him visibility without giving him a personal trophy path if the documentary wins.
