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01
After inviting friends including Tom Hanks, Diane Keaton and Eugene Levy to a dinner party, he married his longtime girlfriend Anne Stringfield in a surprise ceremony at their Los Angeles home.
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02
His business card reads This certifies that you have had a personal encounter with me, and that you found me warm, polite, intelligent, and funny.
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03
An accomplished banjo player, he appears playing the instrument in the Earl Scruggs and Friends video for Foggy Mountain Breakdown, for which he won a Grammy for Best Country Instrumental Performance, making him rare in winning Grammys for both comedy and music.
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04
He fell into a depression for a couple of months after his good friend John Candy died.
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05
His favorite movie of his own is Planes, Trains & Automobiles 1987.
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06
He is skilled with a rope or lasso and did his own rope work in ¡Three Amigos! 1986; he also plays the harmonica.
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07
Once a Disneyland Magic Shop employee on Main Street, USA, he also worked at Knott’s Berry Farm as a comedian in their Birdcage Theatre, where he honed his skills in live performance, improv comedy, banjo playing, juggling, and lassoing, and met his friend Stormie Omartian.
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08
Lorne Michaels, creator of Saturday Night Live 1975, served as best man during his 2007 wedding to Anne Stringfield.
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09
He told Terry Gross on NPR’s Fresh Air that he smoked marijuana in the late 1960s until he had a panic attack at a showing of Mel Brooks’ The Producers 1967, after which he never smoked pot again, believing that negative experience saved him from harder drug abuse.
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10
Though many critics were disdainful of his overtly silly early act, its postmodern nature was admired by avant garde filmmakers David Lynch and Stanley Kubrick, both of whom approached Martin to appear in ultimately unproduced comedy films.
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11
He was Warner Bros. second choice for the role of The Riddler in Batman Forever 1995 after Robin Williams, but turned it down due to sadness from John Candy’s death and his divorce from Victoria Tennant.
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12
Contrary to popular belief, Martin was never a cast member on NBC’s Saturday Night Live 1975; however, he holds the records for guest appearances 25, hosting 15 times, and hosting in a single season 3, and is the only person to have hosted a season premiere, a season finale, and a Christmas show.
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13
He is a member of Mensa, as are James Woods and Ben Rollins.
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14
He studied philosophy at California State University at Long Beach and considered becoming a philosophy professor; he periodically spoofed his studies in his 1970s stand-up act, comparing Philosophy with Geology: If you’re studying Geology, which is all facts, as soon as you get out of school you forget it all, but Philosophy you remember just enough to screw you up for the rest of your life.
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15
He is in the horn section of B.B. King’s In The Midnight Hour music video.
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16
He dated Mary Tyler Moore.
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17
He appeared on an episode of The Dating Game 1965 before he was famous in 1966, winning a date with an old friend Marscha Walker, and appeared again the next year, winning again, wearing the same shirt and jacket.
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18
He became a father for the first time at age 67.
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19
A trustee of the Los Angeles Museum of Art, he collects the art of Georgia O’Keeffe, Richard Diebenkorn, Willem de Kooning, Franz Kline, Cy Twombly, Helen Frankenthaler, Edward Hopper, David Hockney, Roy Lichtenstein, and Pablo Picasso.
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20
He was romantically involved with, and at one point engaged to, Bernadette Peters, with whom he worked in several films in the 1970s and ’80s.
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21
At his insistence, the 1987-1988 season premiere of Saturday Night Live 1975 hosted by Martin went on despite no dress rehearsal, because a fire in a nearby studio had evacuated the cast and crew from Rockefeller Center just before dress rehearsal was to begin.
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22
Even during his stand-up days when he portrayed a wild and crazy guy, in real life he is actually quite shy and quiet.
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23
His study of philosophy was a source of much of his material for his 1970s standup act.
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24
A fan of Monty Python’s Flying Circus 1969, he hosted and narrated the documentary Parrot Sketch Not Included: Twenty Years of Monty Python 1989.
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25
He played the banjo in his guest appearance on The Muppet Show 1976.
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26
With Anne Springfield, he is father of a daughter born in December 2012.
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27
He lists British television especially comedies as his biggest influence.
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28
In 2007 he was a recipient of the Kennedy Center Honors alongside Leon Fleisher, Diana Ross, Martin Scorsese, and Brian Wilson.
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29
He learned to play the banjo by playing LPs at 16rpm speed, which allowed him to more accurately pick individual notes due to the halved playback speed.
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30
He was chosen as #6 in Comedy Central’s 100 Greatest Stand-Ups of All Time.
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31
He is best friends with Martin Short.
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32
When he lived in his Manhattan apartment, his next door neighbor was Mary Steenburgen.
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33
He was voted Most Talented by his classmates at Garden Grove High School.
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34
Stanley Kubrick liked his work in The Jerk 1979 and once considered having him play Bill Harford in Eyes Wide Shut 1999; the role went to Tom Cruise.
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35
He appeared on the college circuit in the 1970s with fellow musical comedian Martin Mull as The Steve Martin Mull Show.
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36
He was one of the first celebrities to pay tribute to Robin Williams on his Twitter feed, and his tribute was featured in many news reports on Williams’ death.
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37
He wore his Inspector Clouseau mustache during his 2007 wedding because he was reprising the role for the upcoming The Pink Panther 2006 sequel.
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38
While filming Dirty Rotten Scoundrels 1988, he and Michael Caine became good friends.
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39
He co-wrote two songs with Martin Mull: Men on the album I’m Everyone That I Have Ever Loved and Westward Ho! on Sex & Violins.
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40
Though he often played fathers in films like Parenthood, Father of the Bride, and Cheaper by the Dozen, he was not a father while making those movies; he became a father in 2012 at age 67.
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41
He was considered for the role of Willy Wonka in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory 2005.
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42
Some sources claim he is a fan of Doctor Who, but in a 2013 Uncut magazine interview he revealed it was a false claim started by someone on the internet.
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43
In 2005 he received the 8th annual Mark Twain Prize for American Humor from the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
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44
He graduated from Garden Grove High School in 1963 also attended Rancho Alamitos High School and was a cheerleader at Rancho, where he often did his King Tut dance.
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45
He released a children’s book, The Alphabet From A to Y: With Bonus Letter Z.
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46
He was a victim of a German art forgery ring; in 2004 he bought a counterfeit painting of artist Campendonk, and luckily he sold it in 2006 before the forgeries were discovered.
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47
Before Christopher Lloyd got the part, he nearly played Doc Brown in Back to the Future 1985.
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48
His performance as Navin Johnson in The Jerk 1979 is ranked #66 on Premiere Magazine’s 100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time.
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49
He has appeared in two films selected for the National Film Registry: Disneyland Dream 1956 and The Muppet Movie 1979.
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50
He has worked with actor Eugene Levy on four films: Father of the Bride 1991, Father of the Bride Part II 1995, Bringing Down the House 2003, and Cheaper by the Dozen 2 2005.
