It was love at first sight for comedian Martin Short and actress Nancy Dolma. The Canadian couple, who met in the mid-1970s and were together for more than 36 years, had arguably one of the strongest celebrity marriages of our time until Nancy tragically passed away from ovarian cancer in 2010.
Now, in a new memoir titled I Must Say: My Life as a Humble Comedy Legend, the Hamilton-born funnyman is finally opening up about life after losing his beloved.
"Some nights, when I'm really missing her, I'll grab a rum and Coke at twilight and sit on the couch on our front porch, or perhaps upstairs, on the balcony off of our bedroom, with the Pacific Ocean in view'. "I'll call out, 'Hey, Nan!' Forming the words just feels good in the throat,” he writes.
Despite having lost his wife four years ago, Martin says she’s still a major part of his life, writing, “I’m still very much married to Nancy.”
He continues: "These, our talks, go on internally, not out loud. You won't find me sitting out there chattering away, switching seats, schizophrenically playacting both parts ... but we do talk, Nancy and I, and I can totally hear where she agrees with me and where she disagrees."
Despite making a career out of laughter, Martin, 64, had little to smile about during his early years. By the time he was 20, he had already lost three family members – his eldest brother, who passed away in a car accident, and his mother and father, both of whom died of an illness within two years of one another.
Refusing to succumb to depression, the tragic events actually made Martin decide to live to the fullest. "I think that kind of loss can fuel how you lead your whole life," he once said in an interview. "I've chosen to treat my life more like a party than something to stress about."
