The morbid gift Kurt Russell gave Val Kilmer: “I guess that pretty much says it all”
It was clear after Val Kilmer’s death that many of his performances live on in the collective cinematic consciousness. He was a versatile actor who was never as famous as he should have been but who nevertheless managed to make an enduring impact in Hollywood. Some will always remember him as the Iceman from Top Gun. Others will always associate him with his portrayal of Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone’s biopic of The Doors’ frontman. Others might favour his comedic turn in Shane Black’s Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.
But if there is one Kilmer performance that can truly be labelled ‘iconic’, it’s his turn as Doc Holliday in the 1993 western Tombstone. It is there that he uttered the immortal line “I’m your Huckleberry”, a profound and mystifying sentence that he delivered to perfection. Based on the legend of the 19th-century lawman Wyatt Earp, Tombstone turned out to be a nightmare to make.
For one thing, Kurt Russell’s take on the story was in direct competition with Kevin Costner, who was making a vastly more expensive version at the same time. For another, the production was pure chaos. Actors threatened to quit, and speculation has swirled in the decades since about how much of the film was actually directed by Russell rather than the nominal director, George P Cosmatos.
In the end, however, it was Tombstone, not Costner’s Wyatt Earp, that took home the accolades and the box office receipts. The former earned over $73million at the box office off a budget of $25m, while the latter earned less than $56m off a budget of $63m.
Although Kilmer sometimes had a reputation for being a challenging collaborator, much of the success of Tombstone can be attributed to Kilmer’s unexpected performance as the tuberculosis-ridden Doc Holliday. He is both intensely moving and deftly comedic, stealing every scene he’s in without having to resort to shouting or gunfire. He is quietly magnetic, a lovable character in the scrum of the Wild West.
With such a turbulent production, the people involved in Tombstone were destined to leave as mortal enemies or close friends. In the case of Kilmer and Russell, it was the latter. Nowhere was this more evident than in the parting gifts they gave each other at the end of production. It’s customary on movie sets for actors to exchange gifts before going their separate ways, and while this probably leads to some expensive but empty gestures, it was much more meaningful for the Tombstone co-stars.
In an interview with GQ, Russell revealed that he purchased a burial site for Kilmer in the Boot Hill Graveyard in Tombstone, Arizona, where several famous outlaws of the Wild West are buried. By coincidence or divine synergy, Kilmer had purchased him a plot of land overlooking the graveyard. “Doc Holliday was all about death, but Wyatt’s all about life,” Russell explained, pointing to the final scene with the two characters in the movie. “I guess that pretty much says it all.”
When Kilmer died in April 2025 after a long battle with throat cancer, he was cremated rather than being buried at the Boot Hill cemetery. Russell did not reveal whether he kept the plot of land that his co-star gifted him.
