Steve Martin is letting his fingers do the walking. The setting is a ritzy hotel in Beverly Hills where he and Goldie Hawn have come to beat the drum for "The Out-of-Towners, "their new movie opening Friday.

Hawn has been asked who designed the flowery silk skirt and fuschia sweater she's wearing. Without missing a beat, Martin is practically undressing his co-star. "I'll find out, "he smirks, reaching into her sweater." Well, we've done this before."

At that, Hawn lets out one of her trademark giggles. "The designer is Marnie, "he informs her.

"And the skirt is by whom?" wonders Hawn, egging him on.

"Hmm, let me check," says Martin, flexing his fingers. "Well, your pantyhose are by 'Hand wash cold." This time, Hawn whoops it up even more. In a few minutes, when the actress and her explosive giggle are gone, the room feels like a balloon with all of its air let out.

"Do you want to come over and check my labels?" deadpans Martin, a strained expression on his face.

Once labeled the ultimate wild and crazy guy, the comedian is actually a mild and sober man. He doesn't crack jokes in interviews. He never pulls practical jokes on friends. He's not a showoff.

"It's embarrassing, "he admits, "but I just cannot be on."

It makes sense that at 53, Martin derives the most satisfaction from writing. His output in recent years has included the hit play "Picasso at the Lapin Agile, "the upcoming Eddie Murphy movie "Bowfinger's Big Thing," and a best-selling short story collection, "Pure Drivel." "There's a different thrill from signing a movie contract, which is nice, to getting a royalty check, "says the man who routinely makes $ 6 million a film. "I look at that $ 2,000 royalty check and I'm just tickled. I'm thinking, 'Wow, they liked my play in Raleigh. ."It's hard to take pleasure in movies anymore because the only success is total. You can't take pride in a medium success or an artistic success. You're only respected if your success is total." It's been a while since Martin has enjoyed a total success. He hasn't been onscreen since he played a supporting role two years ago in David Mamet's "The Spanish Prisoner. "Before that, he starred in the ill-fated "Sgt. Bilko" and the pleasant "Father of the Bride" flicks.

In some ways, he believes that "Bowfinger's Big Thing," which is about the odd-couple pairing of a loser movie producer (Martin) and a Hollywood superstar (Murphy), is his most personal script to date.

"I really enjoy writing for the theater and I think it helped my movie work, "he says. "When you do something so often, you get better at it, of course, but you also get disconnected from it.

"When you find something new you get connected again, which is what I did with writing. After I wrote my play about Picasso, I thought, 'Why can't I write a screenplay in the same spirit, not caring about what anybody thinks?'

"So I did that with 'Bowfinger, which comes out this summer.

Writing it gave me the feeling of what it means to be connected to something again. It stirred up my interest in movies. Even with my acting, I feel as if I can invest more in it again." Case in point: "The Out- of-Towners," which is an update of the 1970 Neil Simon classic starring Sandy Dennis and Jack Lemmon as a couple whose journey to New York City for a job interview turns out to be a trip from hell. In the update, Martin and Hawn go through travel nightmares while trying to halt the unraveling of their marriage.

"I felt free to sort of boldly ad-lib stuff, "says Martin, who was born in Waco, Texas, but raised in Southern California. "There's a scene in a limo with John Cleese and Goldie where I was going, 'Frisky, frisky, frisky. I came up with it on the spot. And Goldie laughed, which is all I needed. It worked."

Hawn and Martin seem to bring out the best in each other. "The Out-of-Towners" marks their first collaboration since 1992's "Housesitter," about a control freak driven crazy by a free spirit.

"Steve is my favorite leading man," enthuses Hawn. "With him, it's like a musical duet. We riff and play and create. And he makes me laugh all the time."

Martin returns the compliment. "The attraction of 'The Out-of-Towners for me was purely Goldie. To be honest, I was nervous about doing it, but she called me up and said, 'This is about something important. It's about the empty-nest syndrome and the rekindling of a love affair that happens afterwards. You can't say no to Goldie or she drives you nuts.

"But I warned her if six months down the line she told me her psychic told her to do the movie, I'd kill her." The man who stepped into Spencer Tracy's shoes for "The Father of the Bride" movies and who took over for Jack Nicholson in "Little Shop of Horrors" had no reservations about adding another remake to his filmography.

"I just wish someone would update 'The Jerk, " he says, referring to his smash film debut. "I'd find that flattering, as a matter of fact. I'd especially like it if Jim Carrey did it, and I wound up making a lot of money."

Martin is a big fan of Carrey's but stops short of praising any of today's other wild and crazy comics. "I haven't seen 'The Waterboy,’ he says. "And that's not a slam against Adam Sandler. I just haven't had time. I liked 'Rushmore’. That was interesting."

Unlike fellow Seventies stand-up icons Whoopi Goldberg and Robin Williams, Martin's critically heralded work in movies like "Roxanne" and "L.A. Story" has never received an Oscar, or even an Oscar nomination.

Asked about the slight, Martin shrugs. "After a while you go, 'Oh, they really don't like me. It's sort of the reverse of Sally Field." Martin maintains that he gets all the respect he needs from fans, especially now that his admirers aren't as wild and crazy as they used to be. "I like getting older because with time, they respect you," he muses. "People are a little awe-struck and more polite than back in the old days when they'd come up to me and practically assault me by yelling, 'Be funny! Do something! Sing 'King Tut."

These days, fans who stop Martin on the street are as likely to rave about his play or his New Yorker essays than to ask him to stick a rubber arrow on his head.

Steve Martin gets sour on Hollywood. 'The Out-of-Towners' star explains why he can't always laugh at his own comedy

Steve Martin (now in ''The Out-of-Towners'' with Goldie Hawn) may have built his early career by being a wild and crazy guy, but these days he's living proof that a life in comedy doesn't always create an upbeat outlook. Thinking back to his own stand-up shtick from the '70s, Martin doesn't even crack a smile: ''I can't watch it -- I don't know why -- even though it was 20 years ago.''

In case you're wondering if Martin would be happier to extricate himself from the whole Hollywood racket, he has at least one reason to put up with it: ''The satisfaction I get from movies is the making of them.'' Of course, his satisfaction tends to diminish after the final scene is shot: ''Once a movie is done you don't know what's going to happen. Maybe it's going to be awful, maybe it's going to be good -- you don't know.''