Steve Martin’s Wild and Crazy Life Lessons

Want to grow old with grace and humor? Well excuuuuuuuse me, but the comedian and actor has provided the blueprint

Eric Spitznagel,

AARP

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Published September 03, 2025

a colorful illustration featuring a portrait of steve martin

Steve Martin reminds us that aging isn’t about slowing down, it’s about adding more instruments to the band.

Agata Nowicka

The fifth season of Only Murders in the Building drops Sept. 9 on Hulu, with three fresh episodes followed by new installments every Tuesday. It’s big news for anyone who loves cozy mysteries, clever comedies or just watching Steve Martin banter his way through Manhattan with Martin Short, 75, and Selena Gomez.

But for those of us who grew up watching Martin, it’s something even sweeter: a reminder that the man who turned 80 this August has no plans of slowing down. For decades, Martin has been our cultural North Star. In the 1970s, he gave us permission to be silly and laugh at jokes our parents didn’t quite get. In the ’80s and ’90s, he showed us how to navigate adulthood, whether fumbling through romance in L.A. Story, learning the true value of friendship in Planes, Trains and Automobiles, or juggling the chaos of family life in Parenthood.

And now, in the 21st century, he’s modeling something rarer: how to grow older with style, grace and a sharp punchline. Consider this his wild and crazy syllabus for aging well.

steve martin and martin short in a scene from only murders in the building

For Steve Martin and Martin Short, aging well is equal parts curiosity, comedy and a healthy respect for window locks.

Patrick Harbron/Disney

You can peak in any — and every — decade

Every decade comes with its own surprises and new chances to reinvent yourself. Martin’s career proves the fun doesn’t expire after your 20s or 30s; it just changes flavor.

Back in the late ’60s, while writing for The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, his writing partner Bob Einstein told him, “You know what’s going to help you? Age.” And he was right. Martin didn’t burn out with age — he leveled up. His comedy got sharper, sillier and more original. He wasn’t chasing trends or politics like other comics in bell-bottoms; he was building an act with the confidence of someone who had lived a little and wasn’t afraid to look ridiculous.

“I’ve always observed that as we all get older, we either turn into our best selves or our worst selves,” Martin told PBS in 2009. He kept leaning into his best self: funnier, wiser and always ready to turn the next decade into a brand-new bit.

Rock that white hair

Martin found his first gray hair at 15, and by his early 30s he was completely silver. For some, this could have led to panic-buying hair dye. For Martin, it became his secret weapon — the shock of white hair made him instantly distinctive. It gave his absurd comedy a strange authority, as if the elder statesman of show business had shown up in bunny ears. The look became inseparable from the act.

As Martin Short once joked with his old pal on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, “You don’t age, and that’s the benefit of looking 70 since you’ve been 30.” So don’t fight the gray. As Martin proves, sometimes the thing you’re most insecure about can turn out to be the very thing that makes you unforgettable.

steve martin smiling while playing a banjo in the woods

Martin's secret to happiness at 80? A banjo, a blazer and a walk in the woods.

NBCU Photo Bank/Getty Images

Stay curious (even about banjos)

Most comedians would’ve been content to let the banjo be a stage prop. Martin turned it into a second career. He has five Grammy Awards, and three of them are for banjo music. Yes, three. For the banjo, not his jokes.

What began as a quirky bit in his stand-up routine grew into decades of serious practice, albums and collaborations with the best bluegrass musicians in the world. The lesson? Curiosity doesn’t come with an expiration date. And it may do more than keep you entertained: A 2024 Georgia Institute of Technology study found that familiar music can actually enhance concentration and learning, while music with a strong emotional tone can reshape the quality of existing memories. In other words, Martin’s banjo obsession hasn’t just kept him sharp and creative, it’s also a reminder that following your curiosity might literally help tune your brain.

Success isn’t always loud

Martin has never needed the spotlight to validate him. Before Only Murders in the Building, his last starring film role was 2011’s The Big Year. Much of the next decade he happily filled with quieter pursuits: writing plays, making the occasional TV or movie cameo and touring with Short since 2015. “My wife keeps saying, ‘You always say you’re going to retire and then you always come up with something,’” he told The Hollywood Reporter in 2022.

In AARP’s 2017 cover story, Martin admitted it took him a long time to realize that being famous wasn’t the same as being fulfilled. “Fame doesn’t make you successful,” he said. “Not as a human being, not in any real way. Since that lesson, it’s been a gentle uphill slope to a real, real happiness.” His life, as he describes it, is “very, very happy” — not because of sold-out tours or Emmy trophies, but because of quieter satisfactions like family, friendship and a career on his own terms.

The numbers back him up. A 2022 “Second Half of Life” study from AARP, in collaboration with National Geographic, found that people often grow happier as they age: 34 percent of adults 80-plus and 27 percent of adults in their 70s report being “very happy,” compared with just 16 percent of people in their 40s. Why? As the years pile up, the focus shifts from quantity of time to quality of life. Concerns over finances, health and purpose ease, while relationships and independence become more central and more rewarding.

steve martin and bernadette peters in a scene from the jerk

In "The Jerk," Martin and Bernadette Peters proved that fashion fades, but fearless absurdity never goes out of style.

Courtesy Everett Collection

Know what you really need (hint: it’s not the paddle game)

In Martin’s movie breakthrough The Jerk (1979), he plays a simple-minded guy who leaves his family in search of fame and fortune, only to discover he’s hilariously unprepared for either. The film’s breakup scene has him storming out of his mansion, insisting he doesn’t need a thing. Except … an ashtray. And a paddle game. And a lamp. And some matches. And a chair. By the end of the scene, he’s staggering under a pile of “essential” junk he can’t quite leave behind.

It’s a master class in how we overestimate what’s necessary, telling ourselves we can’t live without that gadget, that subscription, that clutter in the garage. But the truth is, most of it’s just paddleball energy, stuff we drag along because we’re scared to let it go. And it could be putting our health at risk. A 2024 report from the U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging found that clutter among older adults can not only affect quality of life but can also lead to mental and physical problems, including an increased risk of falling.

Martin’s gag reminds us that freedom comes not from piling on but from stripping down. You don’t need everything, you just need the right things. And maybe, maybe, a lamp.

Stress less, and you might just live longer

In the 2024 documentary Steve! (Martin): A Documentary in 2 Pieces, Martin describes reaching a state he calls pihentagyú, a Hungarian word meaning “with a relaxed brain.” As he puts it: “My brain is relaxed. I’m not under the pressure that I put myself under. I’m not out to prove anything.” Translation: The sooner you stop trying to white-knuckle your way through life, the better everything gets. Pressure doesn’t sharpen you; it just grinds you down.

“I worried all these years that I was going to die, and I never did,” Martin once quipped to AARP. “So why waste all that worry?” That’s an aging mantra worth stitching on a pillow. Life doesn’t come with guarantees, but worry never added a single extra day. If you’re lucky enough to still be here, spend the time laughing instead.

A 2022 study in the journal Developmental Psychology found that older adults are much better at steering clear of stress than their younger counterparts. Compared with 20-somethings, people over 60 are far more likely to give credit to the positive, dismiss the negative and proactively dodge situations that will make them miserable. In other words, life gets easier once you’ve logged enough mileage to know which battles to fight and which ones to shrug off.

Persistence beats talent (almost every time)

Martin never pretended that he was destined for greatness. “I always divide the world up into people like Picasso or Oscar Wilde, who seemed to have been born with their gifts, and the rest of us, who work at what we do,” he once told AARP. “For me, it wasn’t a gift. It was working.”

And work he did. He spent endless nights in tiny clubs, bombing on stage and rewriting material until it clicked. “Thankfully, persistence is a great substitute for talent,” he wrote in his 2007 memoir Born Standing Up. That’s the not-so-glamorous secret to aging well: Effort stacks up. Stick with the practice, the project, the workout, the relationship. The people who look like “naturals” usually just started earlier and didn’t quit.

Exercise gently

Forget 5 a.m. marathons and punishing boot camps. Martin has his own low-drama fitness plan: “I do exercise, but gently,” he told us. A treadmill, some weights and a good audiobook. That’s it. He’s not chasing six-pack abs or training for the Ironman. He loves low-impact traveling by bicycle, as anyone who’s seen his documentary (where Martin Short interviewed him while biking) or follows Martin’s social media can attest. His goal is simple: Stay active enough so you can keep playing music, cracking jokes and maybe solving a murder or two on Hulu.

Science is on his side. A 2022 study in Nature Medicine found that people ages 40 to 69 who engaged in just one to two minutes of brisk movement three times a day significantly reduced their risk of dying from heart disease or cancer. That’s not a triathlon, that’s taking the stairs a few times with purpose. Meanwhile, researchers at the University of Rochester remind us that small, targeted exercises help with the everyday stuff that actually matters as we age: walking pain-free, carrying groceries or scooping up your grandkids without throwing out your back.

martin short, steve martin and chevy chase in a scene from three amigos

Every decade is easier when you’ve got a few amigos by your side like Martin Short, left, and Chevy Chase.

Orion Pictures Corp/Courtesy Everett Collection

Redefine the shape of a life

Martin told us he considers his life’s trajectory to be “actually the perfect shape,” with a career that took off long before he met and married his second wife and settled into fatherhood (daughter Mary was born in 2012). His path played out in reverse: decades spent working obsessively, followed by family years when most people are winding down. It’s proof that life’s milestones don’t need to follow a standard order.

Life isn’t a race to hit milestones on schedule. It’s closer to improv — sometimes out of order, sometimes upside down, but richer when you let it unfold its own way. Martin’s story proves you can flip the script and still land a standing ovation. Or, as he might put it: Life is like comedy — if you get the timing wrong, just pretend you meant it.

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