Live Talks LA brings Steve Martin, Martin Short, Anjelica Huston and Python alums to the Alex

Backstage at the Alex Theatre, the joking between Steve Martin and Martin Short had already begun, with laughs over their matching suits and whatever else happened to be passing in front of them.

After three decades of friendship and collaboration, it was still like an ongoing routine, hardly changed between the dressing rooms and the stage, where a sold-out crowd awaited.

The occasion was a talk on Short’s first book, “I Must Say,” a memoir that recounts a life of comedy and genuine tragedy. Back in June, Short was on the same stage singing, dancing and joking with the Glendale Pops. On Nov. 9, he sat down for an interview with Martin that scratched beneath the entertainer’s surface.

“I’m curious about a specific period in your career,” Martin said. “What happened between the years 1970 and 2005?”

After a pause, Short responded, “You’re good.” Later, he added, “The only difference between you and Charlie Rose? He listens.”

For the next 90 minutes, the two funnymen recounted several events in Short’s book, from personal losses in his family to career highs with “Saturday Night Live” and their 1986 film hit with Chevy Chase, “3 Amigos!”

The night was just one of an ongoing series of events hosted by Live Talks L.A., which has drawn large and enthusiastic audiences to the Alex and elsewhere across Los Angeles to hear from the accomplished likes of songwriter Burt Bacharach, writer Neil Gaiman, comic Chelsea Handler and coach Phil Jackson.

On Tuesday night, Monty Python alums John Cleese and Eric Idle appeared at the Alex. On Thursday, Oscar-winning actress Anjelica Huston sits down with filmmaker Mitch Glazer. More high-profile events will begin in the spring, and virtually all are tied to new books.

“The book world has gone through lots of changes and how people and where people buy books is dramatically changed over the last half-dozen years,” said Ted Habte-Gabr, founder and producer of the series. “They become more than book events. You have a unique pairing involved, so you’re coming to a great show that happens to have a book connected to it.”

In 2011, Habte-Gabr organized an event with Tina Fey and Martin at the Nokia Theatre, and filled 6,000 seats, which “put us on the map,” he said. But the newly refurbished Alex Theatre was also an important discovery for the series, just minutes from downtown Los Angeles.

“Think of the demographic that venue serves,” he said. “There really isn’t a cultural center to L.A. You make it and people will come.”

At the Martin-and-Short talk, tickets for higher-priced orchestra seats included a copy of Martin’s book — about 700 total. Among the audience were a couple of Short’s close friends from “SCTV” — former cast members Catherine O’Hara and Eugene Levy. Other fans had flown in for a rare chance to see the duo onstage together. One couple traveled all the way from New Zealand.

“What prompted you to write a memoir? Was it finally to get a grip on grammar?” Martin asked in a typical ribbing of the night, but soon noted, “This is quite a serious book.”

Short talked of losing a brother and both parents by age 20, and then facing another loss much later in life when his wife died of ovarian cancer in 2010. They had been married 36 years.

“I found myself at 60 in the same position I was at 20,” Short said, explaining that surviving tragedy has been a source of strength. “I could have turned to drugs or ice cream or something. But I think some people are empowered by loss or tough times.”

On Thursday, Huston will be on the same stage to talk about the second volume of her autobiography, “Watch Me,” to a paying audience of admirers. At the release of her first book last year, Huston was surprised to find a crowd of younger women drawn to her signings and speaking events.

“You always expect your own age group to show up,” she said in a telephone interview. She described the process of writing her memoirs as “both easy and painful, very much like life itself — but through a glass darkly. But it was fun. I had a nice experience going back with my memories and learning more about my life, and maybe myself.”

She only occasionally kept a diary during her life, and for the books drew mostly on the memories that remain of her days growing up the daughter of acclaimed director John Huston, her life as a fashion model and, in the newest volume, her years as companion to Jack Nicholson and rise to leading American actress. She won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for “Prizzi’s Honor” in 1985.

In the years since, Angelica Huston has worked with a broad range of auteur film directors, from her father and Woody Allen (“Crimes and Misdemeanors”) to Wes Anderson (“The Royal Tannenbaums”).

“The accomplished ones all know what they want,” says Angelica Huston, who has directed three films. “It might sound like a simple thing, but it sorts the men from the boys.”

For more information on Live Talks LA at the Alex, go to www.alextheatre.org and livetalksla.org.