The one role Bill Murray wishes he could play again: “We should have made it as a modern movie”
As Bill Murray aged into his current status as cinema’s favourite aloof curmudgeon, it became less and less surprising to see him displaying his skills as a dramatic actor. Most of these parts retained flickers of his trademark humour, but Murray’s performances were full of pathos in movies like Lost in Translation, Broken Flowers, and St Vincent. Critics also received them warmly – something that can’t be said for his first attempt at a “serious” role. In fact, Murray himself wishes he had a do-over on that film, which was a long-time passion project.
In the early 1980s, Murray shot to the top of Hollywood’s comedy ranks thanks to his irrepressible turns in Meatballs, Caddyshack, and Stripes. However, when director John Byrum visited his friend Margaret Kelly – Murray’s wife – in the hospital after she gave birth to the couple’s first son, he gifted her a book. Interestingly, though, when he received a phone call the next day, it wasn’t from Kelly. Instead, it turned out Murray had read the novel – W Somerset Maugham’s 1944 novel masterpiece The Razor’s Edge – and been captivated by it.
The Razor’s Edge tells the harrowing yet inspiring tale of Larry Darrell, an American pilot traumatised by his experiences in World War I, who eventually sets off on a journey of self-discovery. Murray was so taken with the text that his first words to Byrum on the phone were, “This is Larry. Larry Darrell.” Soon, Byrum and Murray were driving cross-country while putting together a screenplay for a film adaptation of the novel. However, they struggled to find a studio willing to finance the movie, to their dismay. Luckily, Murray’s pal Dan Aykroyd came up with a cunning plan.
Dan Aykroyd had written a new film and wanted to bring in his Saturday Night Live colleague Bill Murray for a leading role. The project was Ghostbusters—a title that would soon become iconic—but Murray remained characteristically noncommittal. To move things forward, Aykroyd proposed a deal: Murray would agree to star in Ghostbusters if Columbia Pictures financed The Razor’s Edge, a more serious passion project he had long wanted to make. The studio agreed, and both actors walked away with what they wanted.
However, while in pre-production on The Razor’s Edge, Murray was irritated by the studio’s suggestion that the setting be modernised. Instead of making a period movie set after World War II, Columbia wondered if it should be set after the Vietnam War, to appeal more to contemporary audiences. Murray was adamant that the film should stay a period piece, though, and he got his wish.
The Razor’s Edge was released on October 19th, 1984, just six months after Ghostbusters had become a global smash hit. To Murray’s horror, though, audiences stayed away, with the movie making a paltry $6.6 million at the box office – less than half of what Ghostbusters made on opening weekend alone. Reviews were also scathing, with one critic writing, “The Razor’s Edge looks awful and Bill Murray looks stoned. This performance is one-dimensional from start to finish.”
Naturally, Murray was crushed by the abject failure of a project he championed from start to finish. However, as he got more distance from the movie, he realised something most actors would never, ever admit to themselves: the studio was correct. “I kind of deluded myself that there would be a lot of interest,” Murray told Entertainment Weekly in 1993. “I made a big mistake. The studio wanted to make it a modern movie, and I said no, it should be a period piece. I was wrong and they were right.”
Fast-forward to 2025, and Murray still felt the same way about his misguided first attempt at drama. “I think maybe we should have made it as a modern movie,” he told Comic Book. “To me, even though that book was about World War I, to my generation it was about Vietnam and what it was like to come back from that situation and try to find out what life meant after going through the killing field.”
Indeed, it sounds very much like Murray would do things completely differently if he ever got the chance to play Larry Darrell again.
