Meryl Streep and Martin Short: A Complete Relationship Rumor Timeline

Even Meryl Streep is not immune to the Hollywood rumor mill.

While it’s not completely clear when these Hollywood icons officially met, Meryl Streep and Martin Short’s friendship can be traced back nearly a decade. However, after the pair played love interests on Only Murders in the Building, fans began shipping the three-time Oscar-winning actor with the two-time Emmy-winning comedian in real life. (Fun fact: As a couple, they’d just be one Grammy shy of an EGOT.)

It’s been nearly a year since Streep, 75, and Short, 74, first sparked relationship rumors at the 2024 Golden Globes—and while their alleged date night may have been overshadowed by whatever conversation Selena Gomez was having with Taylor Swift that night, fans have been quietly keeping track of the alleged relationship ever since.

Here’s a complete timeline of all those relationship rumors and milestones:

October 17, 2024: Once again, the pair are spotted out to dinner in Santa Monica.

August 22, 2024: The pair hold hands at an Only Murders in the Building premiere in LA.

Meryl Streep and Martin Short at the season-four premiere of Hulu’s Only Murders in the Building at Paramount Studios

Michael Buckner/Getty Images

May 14, 2024: Martin reveals Meryl called him to request a role on OMITB. “The story with Meryl is she phoned me and said, ‘I want to be on it,’” he told People. “They already planned that I would have a theatrical experience and there would be a love interest,” the actor added. “So that was coincidental, but she just wanted to be on the show. She didn’t know about [the love story].”

As for those relationship rumors, he said the attention has been “interesting” and doesn’t mind the questions. “She’s fabulous,” he said. “There’s no one who doesn’t adore her.”

March 17, 2024: The “very close friends” attend another Broadway show together. This time, Merrily We Roll Along.

February 21, 2024: The pair are spotted leaving a restaurant together in Santa Monica.

January 28, 2024: Short doubles down on Club Random with Bill Maher. “We’re not a couple,” he said. “We are just very close friends.”

January 7, 2024: Relationship rumors spark at the 2024 Grammy Awards, leading Short’s rep to declare the pair “are just very good friends, nothing more.”

October 20, 2023: Streep reveals she and husband Don Gummer have been separated for over six years. “Don Gummer and Meryl Streep have been separated for more than six years, and while they will always care for each other, they have chosen lives apart,” her rep told Page Six on October 20. People confirmed the news on October 21.

August 29, 2023: OMITB executive producer John Hoffman tells The Wrap that Streep “thanked” him for writing the romance between her character, Loretta Durkin, and Short’s character, Oliver Putnam. “It’s pretty unexpected to imagine a pairing of Meryl Streep with Martin Short and watch them find this incredible connection together and, as Meryl said, to not have it be twee or about the age or about any of that,” he said. “It’s just a beautiful romance that you buy, I think because of who these two characters are. But then you see Marty step up in ways that are incredible and nobody works harder at it, comes in with more intelligence to the work and then to watch him have these scenes that break your heart and have to be played with such dramatic poignancy, riding the line of keeping it comedic, keeping it mysterious.… I’m amazed.”

February 9, 2023: Streep, Short, and Martin attend a Broadway after-party in NYC.

Martin Short, Meryl Streep, and Steve Martin pose at the opening-night after-party for the play Pictures From Home on Broadway at the Studio 54 Theater on February 9, 2023, in New York City.

Bruce Glikas

January 17, 2023: Gomez, Short, and Steve Martin announce Meryl Streep is joining season three of Only Murders in the Building. In the clip, Streep refers to Short as “Marty.”

June 8, 2017: The pair are seated together at the American Film Institute’s 45th Life Achievement Award Gala Tribute to Diane Keaton.

From left: Steve Martin, Diane Keaton, Martin Short, and Meryl Streep during the American Film Institute’s 45th Life Achievement Award Gala Tribute to Keaton at Dolby Theatre on June 8, 2017, in Hollywood.

Christopher Polk/Getty Images

February 3, 2015: Getty Images’ oldest archived photo of Martin Short and Meryl Streep is taken backstage at his Broadway production of It’s Only a Play.

Martin Short and Meryl Streep pose backstage at the hit play It’s Only a Play on Broadway at the Jacobs Theater on February 3, 2015.

Bruce Glikas

This post may be updated.