rewrite this title ‘The Interview’: Bill Murray Says He’s Not the Man He Used to Be

You’re saying they’re not representative. This is my life. I am engaged all the time. I’m not complaining about it because I hate people that complain about it, but I don’t walk down the street the way that you can walk down the street. I walk down the street, and people go, “Hey you.” I miss walking down the street like you walk down the street. I miss it, but it’s never coming back. So I deal. Most people, I have an OK experience with. Some people you have a spectacular experience with. But my percentages are no different than yours. If you meet a hundred people, I meet a thousand people. Out of your 100, 75 of them are kind of forgettable, right? Maybe 80. Then there’s a handful that are wonderful, and then there’s a handful that are unpleasant and miserable. I have the same numbers. I just have lots more.

The inability to walk down the street anonymously, how did you figure out how to manage that? It’s a continuous process. It is not like, Oh, I figured that one out, because I’m not the same person now that I was 20 minutes ago. I’m not. You can have a different point of view about it. You can hide from people. I’ve walked down the street with a hat down over my head, glasses on my eyes. I loved Covid.

Because you could disappear? Because I could walk down the street with a mask on my face. It was fantastic. But I’ve been all kinds of ways about it, and it’s a continuing development. I used to spend so much energy. People would say, “Can I take your picture?” And I would be the kind of ass that would say, “It’s ‘May I take your picture?’” Do you know how many times I said that to no avail? Absolutely no avail. But I wasted a whole lot of time that way, doing stuff to make it acceptable on my stupid terms, trying to make life more like I like it. What a screw head. So now what I do for a living is, I take cellphone photographs. I’m not an actor. I am a donkey that is photographed with people who don’t know how to operate their own cellphone camera. That’s what I do all day long. I don’t regret it. I don’t resent it. This is what I do, and it’s so simple, and I’ve realized how much energy I was wasting resisting it. It was just crazy, and when it finally hit me, I went: Oh, my God, what a jerk. How could you have been a jerk for that long? [Murray tears up.]

Have you found a way to get fulfillment out of this new job that you have? Also, you got teary-eyed. I didn’t mean to touch a nerve. It’s not so much fulfilling. I’ve gotten pretty good at it. Most people recognize when they see how skillful I am with this reverse, they say: “Oh, my God. How did you do that?” Well, because I’ve done it thousands of times, that’s how I got good at it. It’s like a guy who fixes pipes, got good at it. [Heavy sigh.] This thing is six hours long.

We’re almost done. What you said about being a different person than you were prior — Are we getting anything done here?