Bill Murray Becomes His Character From Rushmore

Brian Fairbanks — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 15:10:00 GMT

When we were in high school, we were one of the last actors to get a call to read for the lead role in Rushmore. But before we could finalize the appointment, Jason Schwartzman was cast and went on to, um, semi-fame.

Anyway, our biggest disappointment about the experience was not getting to mess with Bill Murray all day, especially in the sequence where Max (the Schwartzman character) tries out a bunch of (comic) methods to kill Murray's Herman Blume, who is too busy smoking and drinking himself toward divorce to notice.

Now, Murray has broken his silence about his real-life divorce and internal suffering, saying that kind of life isn't as fun as Blume made it out to be in the film...

Here are the highlights... including word of a Ghostbusters III, woo hoo:

Murray said he identified anew with those characters -- like the dour Herman Blume in "Rushmore" -- when his wife of nearly 11 years filed for divorce in May. In the papers filed by Jennifer Butler Murray, she alleged that Murray abused her and was addicted to alcohol and marijuana.
"That was devastating," Murray said. "That was the worst thing that ever happened to me in my entire life."
Murray said his lowest point came a few weeks ago. When friends asked if he wanted to participate in an air show to support the Illinois United Service Organizations (Murray grew up outside Chicago), he accepted the skydiving invitation.

"They asked me on a day I didn't care," said Murray. "I didn't even care if there was a parachute..."

The writers of "The Office" have been hired to pen a "Ghostbusters III," which Murray thinks could offer a fresh take on the films, the second of which he (and many others) found disappointing.

We're not sure the fact that he doesn't refute any of his ex-wife's charges may not return him to Scanner Emily's good graces, but we feel for the guy: he sounds genuinely sorry for having screwed up...

Read the rest at CNN.com.

Related:

Scanner : jason schwartzman

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