Last month, Bill Murray told the story behind a masked kiss that happened while filming “Being Mortal,” in which an actor is cloaked in a face-covering. This incident triggered sexual misconduct accusations and eventually led Searchlight Pictures to pull the film from release. Aziz Ansari, who is credited with writing and directing the film, made Being Mortal during the COVID-19 pandemic. All cast and crew were masked while shooting to make the production safe. One of his female staffers publicly accused him. On another occasion, Murray, then a longtime Republican congressman, allegedly exposed himself to her. That was the time when the cast and crew got snowed in together in one hotel room.
The other side of the controversy was in 2022, when the interaction allegedly occurred. Murray called the destruction this as a miscommunication, only claiming that he thought that his actions would be comical and quirky. While the response team moved into action almost immediately in response to these allegations. They stopped production and eventually pulled the plug on the movie altogether.
Murray expressed his lingering discomfort regarding the incident, stating, “I don’t go too many days or weeks without thinking of what happened in ‘Being Mortal.’” He reflected on his past experiences, recalling, “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.”
Regardless of his political intentions and despite his belief that the action was completely innocuous, Murray recognized what the action did to those folks. He remarked on the absurdity of the situation, saying, “To me it’s still funny, the idea that you could give someone a kiss with a mask on. It’s still stupid. It’s all it was.” Still, he understood that the world looked at his actions in a drastically different light than he did.
The actor expressed profound remorse over the fact that things got so out of hand. He said he was disappointed that, in his view, the woman didn’t understand him. “You can teach an old dog new tricks. It was a great disappointment because I thought I knew someone, and I did not. I certainly thought it was light. I thought it was funny,” he said.
Murray eventually settled with the woman at the center of the incident. He criticized the arbitration process that followed, advising others against entering such proceedings: “It went to this lunatic arbitration, which, if anyone ever suggests you go to arbitration: Don’t do it. Never ever do it. Because you think it’s justice, and it isn’t.”