Why ‘What About Bob?’ is Bill Murray’s favourite starring role: “God damn, it was funny”
In 2024, Bill Murray is something of an enigma. To legions of comedy fans, he’ll always be the hangdog-faced, absurdist star of iconic comedies like Ghostbusters, Groundhog Day, and Caddyshack. To more modern viewers, he’s likely best known for his indie appearances in films like Rushmore, Lost in Translation, and the Wes Anderson oeuvre. Unfortunately, though, his bad behaviour over the years will also mean many people know him as a superstar actor whose every worst impulse was indulged throughout his career. Interestingly, though, in a recent interview, Murray seemed to acknowledge the negative effect he’s had – but then pulled a classic Murray move by saying his favourite movie is one that saw him feud with his co-star for the entire production.
When Murray sat down with Elvis Mitchell at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2025, he was unusually open about his recent mistakes. In 2022, production on a movie he was starring in called Being Mortal was halted by Searchlight Pictures over allegations of him behaving inappropriately with a young female assistant. The film never began shooting again, and Murray admitted, “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.”
Perhaps more insightful, though, were Murrays thoughts on, as Mitchell put it, playing characters whose charm can be poisonous. “It’s always interesting when you’re playing a guy who has done some damage,” Murray mused. “I’ve done some damage. It’s sort of a penance to play them; to show that you’re accepting responsibility for it.”
On the surface, this seems like a remarkable insight into Murray’s thinking on his behaviour. It maybe showed he had been doing some self-reflection since the Being Mortal incident, and even though he didn’t go into specifics, had been working through his part in it. However, when talk turned to what he thinks of his own movies when he catches them on TV, he chuckled, “Not everything holds up,” before declaring that he recently rewatched one of his movies that he felt held up brilliantly.
Murray revealed that What About Bob?, a 1991 comedy co-starring Richard Dreyfuss, is his favourite Murray movie to see when flicking channels. “I hadn’t seen it for 15 years,” Murray exclaimed. “I saw it and said, ‘God damn, it was funny.'”
Once again, on the surface, this simply seems like Murray reminiscing about one of his old favourites. However, is it a coincidence that during the very conversation where he’s directly addressing his history of damaging behaviour, he chooses to spotlight a film whose shoot was so fraught that his co-star Richard Dreyfuss labelled him an “Irish drunken bully”?
Indeed, both Murray and Dreyfuss have spoken multiple times about how strained their relationship was on that shoot. Both insist that the film itself is extremely funny, but the experience of making it wasn’t pleasant. In 1993, Murray said he and Dreyfuss “didn’t get along on the movie particularly, but it worked for the movie. I mean, I drove him nuts, and he encouraged me to drive him nuts.”
Then, in 2009, Dreyfuss told The AV Club, “We didn’t get along, me and Bill Murray. But I’ve got to give it to him: I don’t like him, but he makes me laugh even now.” In 2019, the Jaws star elaborated on the stressful production by alleging that an inebriated Murray once hurled a glass ashtray at his head, which miraculously missed and struck the wall.
All in all, it’s enough to make you wonder if that button-pushing part of Murray is still alive and well – even when he’s seemingly innocently talking about his favourite film.
