Bill Murray

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William "Bill" Murray is an American actor and comedian. He was born in September 21, 1950 in Wilmette, Illinois and first gained national exposure on Saturday Night Live after Chevy Chase left in the middle of season two and Lorne Michaels hired Murray as Chase's replacement. Though he is now considered one of the best cast member's SNL has ever had, Murray was not that well-liked by fans who were used to seeing Chevy Chase. When Chevy Chase came back to host on the show's third season, he and Murray got into a vicious fight backstage. When Chase came back to host during the show's fifth season, the two did a monologue together showing that all was forgiven. Among his most popular characters on the show was singing Lounge Lizard Nick Winters with his most famous sketch the one where he sings the Star Wars theme with added lyrics: Star Wars...nothing but Star Wars...

Murray went on to star in a number of critically and commercially successful comedic films including Stripes, Tootsie, Caddyshack, Ghostbusters, and Groundhog Day.

He gained additional critical acclaim later in his career, starring in Lost in Translation, for which he was nominated for an Academy Award, and a series of films directed by Wes Anderson, including Rushmore, The Royal Tenenbaums, The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou and Fantastic Mr. Fox. He is widely regarded as one of the most talented and unique comedic actors of his generation.


Bill Murray provides examples of the following tropes:
  • Adam Westing: In Space Jam and Zombieland
  • Cassandra Truth: There's a lot of stories of Bill doing random things to/with people he meets, casually telling them afterwards that nobody will ever believe them when they tell their friends or loved ones about it. The closest response he's given to being asked about these stories falls under the realm of Suspiciously Specific Denial.
    • By late 2014, though, at least half a dozen such stories have been confirmed, usually through YouTube video of the event in question. Since then, such things have gone from "stories no one will believe" to "Bill Murray's done something wacky again" (like the time he led a baseball stadium in singing "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" -- in Daffy Duck voices).
  • Cloudcuckoolander: There is a thread of this running through Murray's personality, and often a torrent of it running through his characters.
  • Deadpan Snarker: All his movies but most notable are Caddyshack and Groundhog Day
    • Comedy Central even named him number one in their special "Mouthing Off: The Fifty-One Greatest Smart-Asses Of All Time".
  • The Tyson Zone: During the late 1990s and early 2000s Murray acquired a body of Urban Legends in which he would reportedly show up doing something completely unexpected -- like taking over as the bartender at a random couple's wedding or working the register at a convenience store -- almost always ending with Murray winking at the witness or otherwise acknowledging he's who he is, and saying "No one will ever believe you." (This reached a point where a website was set up to collect these stories.) With the proliferation of smartphones starting in the early 2010s, though, several such incidents were caught on camera, finally moving them out of the realm of urban legend and firmly into The Tyson Zone.