You might remember that Bill Murray faced misconduct allegations in 2022 that eventually resulted in the shutdown of Aziz Ansari’s directorial debut Being Mortal.
At the time, the actor briefly addressed the allegations in an interview with CNBC. “I had a difference of opinion with a woman I’m working with. I did something I thought was funny, and it wasn’t taken that way,” he said. “The company, the movie studio, wanted to do the right thing, so they wanted to check it all out, investigate it, and so they stopped the production.”
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Bill is currently doing press for his new film The Friend, and in an interview with the New York Times, he addressed his side of the alleged incident in greater detail for the first time.
“I was wearing a mask, and I gave her a kiss, and she was wearing a mask,” he claimed. “It wasn’t like I touched her, but it was just, I gave her a kiss through a mask. And she wasn’t a stranger.”
Bill went on to claim that the incident took place with “someone that I worked with, that I had had lunch with on various days of the week,” and he specified that he was unsure what “prompted” him to kiss the person in question — only that it took place while “we were all stranded in this one room listening to this crazy scene.”
He also attempted to justify his behavior as “something that I had done to someone else before.” “I thought it was funny, and every time it happened, it was funny,” he said.
“It was a great disappointment, because I thought I knew someone, and I did not,” he continued. “I certainly thought it was light. I thought it was funny. To me it’s still funny, the idea that you could give someone a kiss with a mask on. It’s still stupid. It’s all it was.”
“It still bothers me because that movie was stopped by the human rights or ‘H&R’ of the Disney corporation,” he continued. “It turned out there were pre-existing conditions and all this kind of stuff. I’m like, what? How was anyone supposed to know anything like that? There was no conversation, there was nothing. There was no peacemaking, nothing.”
Bill went on to say that he doesn’t “go too many days or weeks without thinking of what happened in Being Mortal.” He also had strong words for the arbitration process that took place after the film was shut down: “If anyone ever suggests you go to arbitration: Don’t do it. Never ever do it. Because you think it’s justice, and it isn’t.”
Which, fine. But — and this is one man’s opinion here — it’s worth taking Bill’s version of what took place with a grain of salt, especially since he doesn’t seem to have much remorse for the incident at large.
A clear missing component to this story is the contents of the actual complaint itself, and without the perspective of the person who made the complaint in the first place, all you have is the side of the story from the person who was alleged to have been the offending party to begin with. It’s worth keeping in mind!