Val Kilmer’s favourite Val Kilmer performance: “I was proud of how completely immersed I was”
In terms of actors with up-and-down careers, there are few with as many peaks and troughs as Val Kilmer endured. As Tom ‘Iceman’ Kazansky in Top Gun, he served as the perfect rival (and later friend) of Tom Cruise’s Pete ‘Maverick’ Mitchell.
But that wasn’t the end of his run as cinematic hero. He got the opportunity of a lifetime to play Bruce Wayne in Batman Forever, and although the film received mixed reviews, he will go down in history as one of a handful of actors to portray the Caped Crusader in live-action form.
Years of career turmoil followed his stint in Wayne Manor. Movies like The Island of Dr. Moreau and Red Planet tainted his image and he gained an unwanted reputation as being a difficult man to work with. Serious health problems, including a well-publicised battle with throat cancer that affected his ability to speak, also dominated discussions of him in the public eye. Before his death, he regained some of his former respect in recent years, though, including through an emotional appearance in Top Gun: Maverick, one of the highlights of the excellent legacy sequel.
It’s been a hell of a ride, one that the star reflected on in an interview with C Magazine whilst promoting Val, a 2021 documentary about his life.
When asked which of his many roles he was most proud of, Kilmer singled out George P Cosmatos’ 1993 western Tombstone. “I was proud of how completely immersed I was in the role,” he said of his time making the cowboy movie. “It was a very well-written script.”
Tombstone tells the real-life story of the infamous ‘Gunfight at the OK Corral’, which took place in the town of Tombstone, Arizona. Kilmer plays Doc Holliday, gunslinger supreme and close friend of respected lawman Wyatt Earp, portrayed on screen by Kurt Russell. In a cast filled out with the likes of Sam Elliott, Bill Paxton, and Michael Biehn, Kilmer’s gruff interpretation of the whiskey-guzzling shooter stands out and earned huge praise. Roger Ebert called it “the definitive saloon cowboy of our time” and used it as the benchmark against which all other cowboy performances were measured. The movie is still one of the highest-grossing modern Westerns.
The movie might have been a success in the end, but there was no guarantee of this. Original director Kevin Jarre, who also wrote the piece, was fired a month into production. According to Kilmer himself (via Geek Tyrant), Kurt Russell basically ended up directing the picture, even though Cosmatos was brought in as Jarre’s replacement.
“Kurt is solely responsible for Tombstone’s success, no question,” he said. “I watched Kurt sacrifice his own role and energy to devote himself as a storyteller, even going so far as to draw up shot lists to help our replacement director, George Cosmatos, who came in with only two days prep,” Kilmer admitted to even moving in with Russell so they could work on the movie in the mornings and evenings.
But the making of the movie was closer to a fraternal friendship than any kid of ego-driven fracas: ”I got all the best lines and he knew it, and still laughed and joked every single day.”
Kilmer’s portrayal of Doc Holliday in Tombstone is remarkable, one of plenty of incredible performances given by the actor. He has every right to be proud of it, not just because it set the bar for modern western acting, but because he managed to achieve it whilst working under the tumultuous conditions of the movie’s troubled production cycle.
