Martin Short has spent five decades being the funniest person in any room, but this week he became the internet's favorite person in any room after a red carpet clip from the *Only Murders in the Building* press tour went viral for reasons nobody planned.
The moment came when a reporter asked Short about working alongside Selena Gomez, his co-star of four seasons.
Instead he paused, looked genuinely puzzled, and said he'd never understood why anyone framed it as a surprising pairing. "She's the most grounded person on that set," he said, before adding that Gomez once talked him through a rough day on location with nothing more than a plate of tacos and a two-hour conversation about nothing.
The clip racked up millions of views in under a day, largely because it's rare to see a comedy legend drop the bit and just mean something.
Fans flooded the comments with the same observation: Short has been Hollywood's most reliable scene-stealer for generations, and yet here he was, giving the spotlight away without a second thought.
It's the latest chapter in an unlikely friendship that has quietly become the backbone of *Only Murders*.
The Hulu series pairs Short and Steve Martin as two washed-up true-crime obsessives who team up with Gomez's character to solve a murder in their building.
On paper, the generational gap was a gimmick.
Four seasons in, it's the show's emotional center.
Behind the scenes, the trio's chemistry has become its own subplot.
Martin and Short have been a comedy double act since *Three Amigos* in 1986, and their off-screen dynamic — old friends who finish each other's sentences and bicker like brothers — translates directly to camera.
Gomez, 32, has described herself as the "third wheel who somehow became the glue." What makes the viral moment land is timing.
Short has been on a career renaissance that few saw coming: an Emmy nomination for *Only Murders*, a buzzy cameo in a streaming thriller earlier this year, and a memoir that spent weeks on bestseller lists.
He's also been candid about grief, having lost his wife Nancy Dolman in 2010, and about how work kept him upright in the years after.
That honesty is part of why audiences respond to him differently now.
Short still shows up to interviews in tailored suits and oversized glasses, still name-drops *SCTV* era war stories, still refuses to take any of it too seriously.
But when the topic turns to his co-stars, the schtick drops.
Season five of *Only Murders in the Building* is already in production, and the show's creators have hinted the new batch of episodes pushes the trio into messier territory.
If the red carpet clip is any indication, audiences are just as invested in the friendship as they are in the mystery. **Our take:** Short has spent his whole career being the guy who makes everyone else funnier, and this moment proved he's also the guy who makes everyone else feel seen.
Final Thoughts
In an industry that rewards volume, his quiet generosity is the loudest thing on the carpet.