Bill Murray details Being Mortal controversy that led to film being scrapped (2025)

Being Mortal was set to be Aziz Ansari’s directorial debut. And backed with a cast that included himself, Bill Murray, Seth Rogen, and Keke Palmer, along with Ansari’s own skills he honed with his show Master of None, the movie was one that was on the radar. But it all fell apart after Murray was accused of committing what was described as “inappropriate behavior” on the set.

Three years after production halted on Being Mortal, Bill Murray says he’s still haunted by the movie being shut down halfway through, further explaining the circumstances of the moment that caused it all. “I don’t go too many days or weeks without thinking of what happened on Being Mortal…I thought I was trying to make peace, I ended up, in my mind, being barbecued. Someone that I worked with, had lunch with on various days of the week and so forth. It was Covid, we were all wearing masks and we were all just stranded in this one room listening to this crazy scene. And I don’t know what prompted me to do it, it’s something that I had done to someone else before and I thought it was funny and every time it happened it was funny. I was wearing a mask and I gave her a kiss and she was wearing a mask. It wasn’t like I touched her, it was just [makes smooching sound], I gave her a kiss through a mask, through another mask, to another person. And she wasn’t a stranger.”

But Bill Murray’s actions, however he meant them to be taken, were all it took for Being Mortal to be scrapped by Searchlight Pictures. And Murray continues to defend his move, adding that the idea of kissing through masks is a comedic set-up. “You know, you can teach an old dog new tricks. But I just thought it was a disappointment. It was a great disappointment because I thought I knew someone and I did not. And I certainly thought it was light and I thought it was funny. And to me it’s still funny, the idea that you could give someone a kiss with a mask on, it’s still stupid. That’s all it was.”

We all know that Bill Murray has a certain reputation for his on-set behavior. And however true or untrue some of the stories are, it didn’t stop a number of publications from throwing them online, especially in the wake of Being Mortal. But for Murray, it’s more or less a witch hunt, saying, “When someone has an episode like mine on this Being Mortal thing, the world goes searching for more proof that this person is a monster — an absolute monster. Well, I’ve had interactions with hundreds of thousands of people over 40, 50 years. Now, you can come up with half a dozen. If you really worked, you’d probably come up with a couple dozen.” Care to comment, Richard Dreyfuss?

While we’ll never see Being Mortal in its planned form (there have been talks of revisiting it at some point), Ansari instead lined up his true directorial debut, Good Fortune, which stars himself, Keanu Reeves, Seth Rogen, and Keke Palmer. Hm, notice anyone missing…?