Latest / DISGRACELAND / Bill Murray: Airport Drug Busts, Backstage Brawls, and Crashing Elvis’s Burial

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Bill Murray: Airport Drug Busts, Backstage Brawls, and Crashing Elvis’s Burial · DISGRACELAND

0:00
Speaker 1: Disgraceland is a production of Double Elvis. This is a
0:28
Speaker 1: story about a bomb threat, about a drug bust, about
0:32
Speaker 1: the burial of a king crashed by a court jester.
0:36
Speaker 1: It's about a fight with Chevy Chase backstage at SNL
0:40
Speaker 1: that almost aired live on national television. And it's about
0:44
Speaker 1: a world renowned smartass, a comedic actor who never fails
0:49
Speaker 1: to subvert and always succeeds in cutting me up. This
0:54
Speaker 1: is about Bill Murray, a great comic, a comic who
0:59
Speaker 1: is currently on tour or making music, some of it great,
1:02
Speaker 1: I'm sure, unlike that music I played for you at
1:06
Speaker 1: the top of the show. That wasn't great music. That
1:10
Speaker 1: was a preset loop for my mellotron called Crashing the
1:13
Speaker 1: Party MK. Two. I played you that loop because I
1:18
Speaker 1: can't afford the rights to Bridge Over Troubled Water by
1:21
Speaker 1: Simon and Garfunkel. And why would I play you that
1:25
Speaker 1: specific slice of algebra Teacher Cheese? Could I afford it?
1:31
Speaker 1: Because that was the number one song in America on
1:34
Speaker 1: September twentieth, nineteen seventy, And that was the day Bill
1:38
Speaker 1: Murray was arrested for possession of over twenty thousand dollars
1:42
Speaker 1: in marijuana, an event that shifted his career course from
1:45
Speaker 1: drug dealer to comedy legend. On this episode, a bomb thread,
1:52
Speaker 1: a drug bust, burying a king and brawling with Chevy
1:56
Speaker 1: Chase and Bill Murray.
1:58
Speaker 2: I'm Jake Brennan and this this disgrace Sland.
2:30
Speaker 1: He says he's got two bombs in a suitcase. The
2:34
Speaker 1: ticket agent kept her voice down on the phone. No
2:37
Speaker 1: need to advertise that there might be a terrorist at
2:40
Speaker 1: O'Hare International Airport walking among them right the second. Thank
2:45
Speaker 1: god she didn't let him board that flight to Denver.
2:48
Speaker 1: Maybe she just saved a few dozen lives, and maybe
2:51
Speaker 1: they call her a hero. She whispered information to the
2:55
Speaker 1: US marshals on the line. The suspect was young, college ade,
3:00
Speaker 1: brown hair, tall, definitely over six feet, and he looked smug, Yeah, smug,
3:06
Speaker 1: with a big mouth. It gave her a lot of
3:08
Speaker 1: lip when she wouldn't let him board the next tw waveflight.
3:11
Speaker 1: It was against protocol to let someone board without an ID,
3:15
Speaker 1: and this kid had nothing to show for himself. If
3:18
Speaker 1: only he had a driver's license, he could prove that
3:21
Speaker 1: he was in fact William James Murray Bill to his friends.
3:26
Speaker 1: But the stewardess stood her ground, no ID, no entry.
3:31
Speaker 1: Bill then dropped the alarming comment, that's too bad. I
3:35
Speaker 1: wanted to get on because I got two bombs in
3:36
Speaker 1: my suitcase. Yeah, that wasn't gonna fly, and neither was he.
3:42
Speaker 1: September twenty first, nineteen seventy aka Bill Murray's twentieth birthday
3:48
Speaker 1: aka the day he was arrested for the first time.
3:53
Speaker 1: Of course, Bill Murray wasn't a terrorist. He dabbled in
3:56
Speaker 1: some nefarious ship, but the flight attendant had it all wrong.
4:00
Speaker 1: Bill wasn't a threat. He was just a drug dealer,
4:03
Speaker 1: a run of the milk kid selling Jamaica's finest grass
4:06
Speaker 1: to get him through college. Bill was a student at
4:09
Speaker 1: Regis College in Denver pre med leafy Green Medicine was
4:13
Speaker 1: practically part of his education. Technically, he was healing people. Besides,
4:19
Speaker 1: every college kid needed a shitty job to help them
4:21
Speaker 1: scrape by. Bill just happened to opt for a gig
4:24
Speaker 1: that aligned with his career path and traveled the country
4:27
Speaker 1: peddling pot by the kilo. It was a surprisingly rewarding job.
4:32
Speaker 1: Every time Bill returned to Denver, he had a new
4:34
Speaker 1: story to regale his friends with. Bill observed his clients
4:38
Speaker 1: carefully made up little bits about their characteristics and quirks.
4:43
Speaker 1: It made him a better storyteller and an even more
4:46
Speaker 1: convincing actor. Bill already wasn't half bad at putting on
4:50
Speaker 1: a show, thanks to years of taking roles in high
4:53
Speaker 1: school plays. It was a win win job. The stories
4:58
Speaker 1: from dealing Grass elevated his work ice cracks and kept
5:01
Speaker 1: cash in his pocket with zero repercussions. The police only
5:05
Speaker 1: sniffed him out once in some unremarkable Midwest town. It
5:10
Speaker 1: was the most podunk, ragtag team of cops Bill had
5:13
Speaker 1: ever seen. They arrested him for dealing, but had to
5:16
Speaker 1: release Bill when they lost the evidence. Other than that
5:20
Speaker 1: pitiful running, Bill's record was squeaky clean until today. The
5:27
Speaker 1: ticket agent was watching him like a hawk. If this
5:30
Speaker 1: so called terrorist was sweating it, he sure didn't show it.
5:34
Speaker 1: Bill was down the hall, tugging on the lockers. He
5:37
Speaker 1: felt around his pants pockets for change and found none,
5:40
Speaker 1: just a personal check from his last client. No quarters
5:44
Speaker 1: meant no locker, which meant no place to stash the
5:47
Speaker 1: luggage he just called attention to. Now Bill started to sweat.
5:53
Speaker 1: There were five bricks of grass dashed in his suitcase,
5:56
Speaker 1: two pounds each worth twenty grand. Total, it's over one
6:00
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty thousand dollars in today's money. It was
6:03
Speaker 1: too late for Bill to save himself. Chicago vice detectives
6:07
Speaker 1: were already on the move, barreling towards him from down
6:09
Speaker 1: the hall. He had to think quick. Bill took the
6:12
Speaker 1: check from his pocket, stuffed it in his mouth, and
6:14
Speaker 1: swallowed the mystery client was safe, but Bill wasn't. The
6:20
Speaker 1: cops tore apart his luggage and found the weed, which
6:22
Speaker 1: was a welcome relief compared to what they thought they
6:24
Speaker 1: were searching for. But that relief didn't spare Bill a
6:27
Speaker 1: date in narcotics court. He was arrested and slapped with
6:30
Speaker 1: a charge for possession of marijuana with no prior rap sheet.
6:34
Speaker 1: The court let him off with five years probation and
6:37
Speaker 1: no jail time, but Bill's days in medicine were over
6:42
Speaker 1: as a dealer and a doctor. It would only be
6:45
Speaker 1: a matter of time until Regi's college learned that one
6:48
Speaker 1: of their students not only made a bomb threat, but
6:50
Speaker 1: was also earning his tuition with illegal drug sales. And
6:54
Speaker 1: the entire ordeal was so stupid that it made the
6:56
Speaker 1: Chicago Tribune. The article mentioned Bill by name. Before Regis
7:01
Speaker 1: could expel him, Bill showed himself out. There would be
7:04
Speaker 1: no flight back to Denver. He was stuck in the
7:07
Speaker 1: suburbs of Chicago. Now back to Evanstone. Back home. For
7:13
Speaker 1: Bill Murray, home was where everything and nothing happened all
7:17
Speaker 1: at once. His parents' house crawled with nine children, and
7:21
Speaker 1: that was the everything. Bill was a fifth kid, a
7:24
Speaker 1: true middle child, with all the textbook symptoms of craving
7:28
Speaker 1: attention his childhood. The house was his first stage, a
7:31
Speaker 1: place where he commanded his parents' attention with goofy Jimmy
7:35
Speaker 1: Cagney impressions at the dinner table bonus laughs if he
7:38
Speaker 1: fell down and hit his head afterwards. But outside of
7:42
Speaker 1: that house there was a whole lot of nothing. Evanston
7:46
Speaker 1: was twenty miles north of Chicago, which meant it was
7:48
Speaker 1: twenty miles north of anything they could get your blood pumping.
7:52
Speaker 1: Bill pivoted between jobs basic stuff like landscaping and surveying
7:57
Speaker 1: and laying concrete bricks, which was nearly as much fun
8:01
Speaker 1: or lucrative as transporting bricks of weed across America, by
8:04
Speaker 1: the way, and then he took shifts at Little Caesars
8:07
Speaker 1: as a pizza maker, where he swiped chunks of raw
8:09
Speaker 1: doau to eat when no one was looking. He was
8:12
Speaker 1: that hungry. The pay was that bad. Life in Evanstone
8:16
Speaker 1: just wasn't happening, and there was no promise, no metaphorical
8:21
Speaker 1: stage to act out on. If you wanted culture, you
8:24
Speaker 1: get a head into the city, just like Bill's older
8:27
Speaker 1: brother did. Brian Murray had an apartment in the Old
8:32
Speaker 1: Town section of Chicago that Bill liked to visit. As
8:35
Speaker 1: it turns out, entertaining ran in the family. Brian worked
8:39
Speaker 1: with a well established improv troop called the Second City.
8:43
Speaker 1: They were a wise cracking set of gestures from Chicago,
8:47
Speaker 1: a perfect organization for Bill to fit into. It wasn't
8:51
Speaker 1: long before Bill was tagging along and taking improv workshops
8:54
Speaker 1: with the troop. It wasn't interstate drug dealing, but it
8:58
Speaker 1: was more interesting than whatever day job had a breaking
9:00
Speaker 1: his back from minimum wage. What's the worst that could happen?
9:07
Speaker 1: Bill Murray walked off the stage, through the wings of
9:10
Speaker 1: the theater and right out the back door and toward
9:13
Speaker 1: the street. It was the only way to leave with dignity. This,
9:18
Speaker 1: This is the worst thing that could happen. Bill's on
9:21
Speaker 1: stage comedy debut was to be frank disastrous. Bill bombed
9:27
Speaker 1: so badly that he didn't want to stick around and
9:29
Speaker 1: hear what people had to say. On the outside, he
9:32
Speaker 1: looked cool, but on the inside Bill was breaking down.
9:36
Speaker 1: It was clear this comedy thing wasn't going to work out.
9:39
Speaker 1: Just like his attempts at becoming a dealer and a healer,
9:42
Speaker 1: the confident, smartass inside of him shrank away. He walked
9:47
Speaker 1: down the sidewalk away from the theater. He kept going.
9:50
Speaker 1: He wasn't going to stop until he reached Lake Michigan,
9:53
Speaker 1: and when he got there he would swan dive from
9:55
Speaker 1: this life into the next. Comedy was his third strike
10:00
Speaker 1: out for good. His inner compass pointed toward Lake Michigan,
10:04
Speaker 1: toward the end. That was the right direction, he was
10:08
Speaker 1: sure of it. He gained speed and headed straight down
10:12
Speaker 1: Michigan Avenue. He didn't stop until he hit the Art
10:15
Speaker 1: Institute of Chicago. His compass told him to turn a
10:18
Speaker 1: corner and duck inside, and Bill brushed past the donation
10:22
Speaker 1: bin without even reaching for his wallet. I mean, he
10:25
Speaker 1: was going to die, so what was the point. He
10:28
Speaker 1: didn't stop walking until he saw a painting that stopped
10:30
Speaker 1: him in his tracks. It was an oil on canvas
10:34
Speaker 1: piece by a peasant woman barefoot in the fields with
10:37
Speaker 1: a scythe in her hand, The Song of the Lark
10:40
Speaker 1: by Jules Breton. The sun poked out on the horizon
10:44
Speaker 1: behind the woman. Her back turned away from the light,
10:48
Speaker 1: but the sun was rising regardless. Bill paused, his compass
10:53
Speaker 1: spawn out of control. Why was he following it? This
10:57
Speaker 1: compass was broken? Lake Michigan was the wrong direction. Actually,
11:02
Speaker 1: it was so plain to see. Now is in her
11:04
Speaker 1: smartass piped up? That woman doesn't have a lot of prospects,
11:08
Speaker 1: But the sun's coming up anyway. She's got another chance,
11:11
Speaker 1: and so did Bill Maury. He stepped out of the
11:14
Speaker 1: museum and faced the sunlight. Lake Michigan would have to wait.
11:45
Speaker 1: The whole audience is under arrest. The voice on the
11:49
Speaker 1: megaphone cut through the crowd. People winced and threw their
11:52
Speaker 1: hands over their years. The strong ones squinted and leaned
11:56
Speaker 1: forward in their seats to see who was admonishing them
11:58
Speaker 1: on stage? Was that Marlon Brando Truman Capoti? No, it
12:05
Speaker 1: was John Belushi dressed as an archbishop. It made no
12:10
Speaker 1: sense wasn't supposed to the core of the National Lampoon
12:15
Speaker 1: Show was absolute nonsense. Committing blasphemy was child's play for
12:20
Speaker 1: these actors, especially for John Belushi. Belushi was the spirit
12:24
Speaker 1: of the Lampoon in Karnate Ir Reverend Witty truly edgy.
12:29
Speaker 1: We're talking about the National Lampoon, a publication that once
12:33
Speaker 1: published an issue with a dog on the cover a
12:36
Speaker 1: pistol pointed straight at its head with a caption that said,
12:39
Speaker 1: if you don't buy this magazine, we'll kill this dog.
12:43
Speaker 1: You get the idea. The National Lampoon Show made the
12:46
Speaker 1: magazine's cost a commentary leap from its pages and take
12:49
Speaker 1: form and actors such as Gilda Radner and Harold Ramis.
12:53
Speaker 1: John Belushi even tapped Bill Murray, an up and coming
12:55
Speaker 1: comedy pal from Chicago, to dine at this all you
12:58
Speaker 1: can eat buffet of vulgars, skits, and cheap shots. Bill's
13:02
Speaker 1: flippant attitude made him a perfect fit for the Lampoons.
13:05
Speaker 1: Traveling Offendathon, the Review toured American colleges in Canadian bars
13:10
Speaker 1: in the mid nineteen seventies and eventually found a home
13:13
Speaker 1: off Broadway at the New Palladium. Theater on West fifty
13:16
Speaker 1: first Street, New York. Audiences gathered late at night to
13:19
Speaker 1: witness the cast shock schlock brand of comedy, The Wildest
13:23
Speaker 1: Reality Is unfolded after midnight on stage at the New Palladium.
13:27
Speaker 1: The skits were tasteless, but so was the audience. Crowds
13:32
Speaker 1: were rowdy, often drunk stoned. Nightly brawls were inevitable. The
13:37
Speaker 1: show mostly brought up the worst in people, being the
13:40
Speaker 1: crowd and the cast. The chatter and the audience hummed
13:46
Speaker 1: in Bill Murray's ear. It was incessant, like a buzzing fly.
13:50
Speaker 1: He tried to block out the noise as he acted
13:52
Speaker 1: out a skit, a shockingly normal number about living in
13:55
Speaker 1: the Big City. Bill was used to heckling, but this
13:59
Speaker 1: was different. This was just plain rude. The National Lampoon
14:04
Speaker 1: Show actors were rude too, but they were funny. Bill
14:07
Speaker 1: didn't see any humor in this situation. He projected his
14:11
Speaker 1: voice over the chit chat. Whoever was yucking it up
14:14
Speaker 1: in the front must not have heard how Bill Dealt
14:16
Speaker 1: would push the audience members. One drunk schmuck in Toronto
14:20
Speaker 1: was so mouthy that Bill personally pulled him into a
14:22
Speaker 1: back alley and broke his arm. He was prepared to
14:25
Speaker 1: do it again if he had to. Bill scanned the
14:28
Speaker 1: crowd for the asshole who couldn't keep his mouth shut,
14:31
Speaker 1: and the jerk was seated up front, some blondheaded prick
14:35
Speaker 1: who was nearly spilling his drinks on himself, fully absorbed
14:38
Speaker 1: in a conversation with his buddy. His name was Martin Maull,
14:42
Speaker 1: a name you might recognize from his roles in nineteen
14:45
Speaker 1: eighties comedy classics like Mister Mom and Clue, except those
14:49
Speaker 1: films didn't exist yet. In nineteen seventy five. Martin Mall
14:53
Speaker 1: was a folk singer, years away from his first movie role.
14:57
Speaker 1: He opened for Billy Joel, for Randy Newman. He was
15:00
Speaker 1: a performer of that caliber. The point is, a performer
15:03
Speaker 1: of that caliber should have known how to behave when
15:05
Speaker 1: someone else was on stage. But Martin Maull was too
15:10
Speaker 1: shit faced to keep quiet, so he didn't. He talked NonStop,
15:14
Speaker 1: and then he took his fat mouth backstage to congratulate
15:17
Speaker 1: the crew on the great performance that he barely saw.
15:20
Speaker 1: Bill Murray had already heard enough. He recognized Martin Maull
15:24
Speaker 1: was the loud mouth from up front. And he instantly
15:26
Speaker 1: lunged at him. He wrapped his hands around the folk
15:29
Speaker 1: singer's throat, and this was no fistfight. Bill Murray was
15:33
Speaker 1: ready to wring Martin Bull's neck like a damn towel.
15:36
Speaker 1: I'll kill him. I'll kill that fucker, Bill yelled as
15:39
Speaker 1: he pressed his thumbs into Martin's neck. Rage funneled into
15:43
Speaker 1: his fingertips. He talked through the whole thing, I fucking
15:46
Speaker 1: hate him. Lucy rushed over and pried Bill's hands off
15:50
Speaker 1: Martin's neck before he could do any real damage, and
15:53
Speaker 1: Martin didn't stick around to say goodbye. He made his
15:56
Speaker 1: exit stage left. Medium talent Talent Billy yelled as Martin
16:00
Speaker 1: rushed away. Medium Talent Bill was incensed. He had no
16:07
Speaker 1: interest in hanging around these half ass phonies and their mediocrity.
16:11
Speaker 1: If Bill was going to be the best, he needed
16:13
Speaker 1: to be around the best all the time, on the
16:17
Speaker 1: stage and off of the stage, even if it meant
16:20
Speaker 1: catching a last minute flight to Memphis. The crowd rammed
16:29
Speaker 1: into the fence again, harder this time, and they had
16:32
Speaker 1: no reason to hold back. Soon their idol would be
16:35
Speaker 1: gone forever, never to be seen in the flesh ever. Again.
16:40
Speaker 1: A cemetery gate separated them from their last glimpse of
16:43
Speaker 1: the king, and that gate had to go. It was
16:47
Speaker 1: now or never. The crowd heaved into the back gate
16:50
Speaker 1: again and their bodies a sweaty wrecking ball. The ninety
16:53
Speaker 1: degree Memphis heat helicopters hovered overhead. It was August eighteenth,
16:58
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy seven, the day America buried its only royalty Elvis.
17:04
Speaker 1: Presley had left the building. The King is dead, Long
17:08
Speaker 1: Live the King. Bill Murray watched the riot wrestle with
17:12
Speaker 1: the back gate at Forest Hill Cemetery, which by the way,
17:16
Speaker 1: was where Elvis was initially buried next to his mother
17:18
Speaker 1: before they were moved to the plot at Graceland. Bill
17:21
Speaker 1: shook his head. If they wanted to get inside the cemetery,
17:24
Speaker 1: they needed to be subtle, sneaky, do something like hop
17:28
Speaker 1: on the press bus that was headed stray for Elvis's gravesite,
17:31
Speaker 1: just like Bill had done. He missed the actual viewing
17:34
Speaker 1: at Graceland. The Presley family closed it off once they
17:38
Speaker 1: heard the National Inquirer was paying big money for photos
17:41
Speaker 1: of the King in his casket. Bill grabbed an empty
17:44
Speaker 1: seed on the press bus, though, and he headed into
17:46
Speaker 1: the cemetery. Regardless, It crawled forward at five or six
17:50
Speaker 1: miles an hour, stifled by the number of mourning fans
17:53
Speaker 1: clogging the streets, and the hears inched along behind them,
17:57
Speaker 1: surely moving even slower. It would be a way while
18:00
Speaker 1: before the King reached his final resting place. But when
18:03
Speaker 1: the bus finally pulled into the cemetery, Bill got a
18:06
Speaker 1: good look at the riot. The crowd never broke down
18:09
Speaker 1: the gate. In fact, when Elvis made his grand entrance,
18:13
Speaker 1: Bill was the only person standing in the cemetery. The
18:17
Speaker 1: cops pulled in first, twenty four of them in a row,
18:21
Speaker 1: each one eyeing Bill Murray like prey. Their militant glares
18:25
Speaker 1: told Bill everything he needed to know. One move, motherfucker,
18:29
Speaker 1: and your funeral will be next. So he froze in place,
18:32
Speaker 1: and people began to point, and they signaled Bill out,
18:36
Speaker 1: and they stared. Wait were people recognizing him? Bill was
18:43
Speaker 1: a fresh face on Saturday Night Live SNL. Producer Lauren
18:47
Speaker 1: Michaels had freed Bill from his rut of rude comedy
18:49
Speaker 1: with the National Lampoon Show earlier that year, and maybe
18:53
Speaker 1: he really was rising up in the ranks on his
18:56
Speaker 1: way to being one of the greats, one of the best,
18:59
Speaker 1: just like Ella. That's when Bill saw the name on
19:02
Speaker 1: the grave in front of him, Gladys Presley. He was
19:06
Speaker 1: standing at the grave of Elvis's mother. That was why
19:10
Speaker 1: people couldn't stop looking at him. It had nothing to
19:13
Speaker 1: do with Bill or SNL or fame. Bill Murray was
19:16
Speaker 1: just the guy who played characters like Nick the lounge
19:19
Speaker 1: singer on late night TV in the presence of the King.
19:24
Speaker 1: Bill was the medium talent. We'll be right back after this.
19:32
Speaker 2: We're we're, we're.
19:43
Speaker 1: It was minutes before Saturday Night Live went on air,
19:47
Speaker 1: but no one was laughing. The cast members were keeping
19:50
Speaker 1: to themselves. Backstage. The crew eyed tonight's guest host with distrust,
19:56
Speaker 1: and they were not fans. February eighteenth, teen seventy eight,
20:01
Speaker 1: barely a year prior, Chevy Chase had been one of
20:04
Speaker 1: the vital members of SNL, original cast member, the first
20:08
Speaker 1: anchor ever to host the satirical weekend Update segment, which
20:12
Speaker 1: remains part of the show today. Chevy was hot shit
20:15
Speaker 1: and he knew it, and when he signed a three
20:17
Speaker 1: picture deal with Universal, he made sure everyone around him
20:21
Speaker 1: knew it too. Chevy's departure from Saturday Night Live was
20:26
Speaker 1: less than graceful. He made it seem like he was
20:29
Speaker 1: graduating from TV to film while everyone else was a
20:32
Speaker 1: dunce being held back a grade. Yet SNL have been
20:35
Speaker 1: able to replace him in just five weeks. In early
20:39
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy seven, Bill Murray filled the Chevy Chase sized
20:42
Speaker 1: hole in the cast. He was back to working with Belushi,
20:45
Speaker 1: Gilda and Harold Ramis again. The Lampoon gang was back
20:49
Speaker 1: on their old bullshit. His old pals quickly brought Bill
20:52
Speaker 1: up to speed on Chevy Chase's whole deal, like how
20:56
Speaker 1: Chevy treated the rest of the actors as if he
20:58
Speaker 1: was better than them. And now he was back as
21:01
Speaker 1: Tonight's guest host the movie star mingling with the not
21:05
Speaker 1: ready for Primetime Peasants, and there was an unspoken expectation
21:09
Speaker 1: that Bill would strike back, knocked Chevy down a peg
21:12
Speaker 1: or two, since he had the gall to show his
21:14
Speaker 1: face here again. Bill and his temper were happy to oblige.
21:19
Speaker 1: No two stories about what happened next are exactly alike,
21:24
Speaker 1: and this thing is stuff of thirty rock legend passed
21:27
Speaker 1: down from generation to generation, with the details shifting in
21:30
Speaker 1: each retelling, but we do know it went something like this.
21:37
Speaker 1: Bill and Belushi were shooting the shit on the couch
21:40
Speaker 1: in a dressing room when Bill saw Chevy in his doorway.
21:43
Speaker 1: He told Chevy to knock off the big shot act,
21:46
Speaker 1: and Chevy changed the subject and immediately went for the jugular,
21:49
Speaker 1: said the acne scars on Bill's face looked like craters
21:52
Speaker 1: on the moon. Bill bit back and made a comment
21:55
Speaker 1: about Chevy's floundering second marriage. Why don't you fuck your
21:58
Speaker 1: wife once in a while, she needs it. Then the
22:02
Speaker 1: gloves really came off. Bill sprang up from the sofa
22:05
Speaker 1: in charge toward Chevy. Chevy hopped into a fighting stance,
22:09
Speaker 1: straight back, feet shoulders in length the park. Chevy knew
22:12
Speaker 1: on a scrap he had an older brother who kicked
22:14
Speaker 1: a crap out of him, even boxed for fun. Chevy
22:17
Speaker 1: was a pro and fistfights. To him. This was no
22:20
Speaker 1: sweat like David versus Goliath, and He's sure wasn't. David.
22:24
Speaker 1: Belushi launched off the sofa to block Chevy from the attack.
22:27
Speaker 1: In the nick of time, Chevy threw punches at Pepper
22:30
Speaker 1: Belushi's forehead. Bill's fist met the back of Belushi's scalp
22:33
Speaker 1: was a tangle in ego, screams, slaps, savage, name calling.
22:38
Speaker 1: Another cast member eventually forced Chevy's arms behind his back
22:41
Speaker 1: and pulled him away. Chevy, dude, you have an opening
22:45
Speaker 1: monologue to do, like right this second, and Chevy pivoted
22:49
Speaker 1: to hosting mode like a seasoned pro. As he made
22:53
Speaker 1: his way towards the stage, Bill chanted a familiar phrase
22:56
Speaker 1: at his back. Medium talent, medium talent. But wait, what
23:04
Speaker 1: if Bill was the medium talent? After all, Chevy was
23:09
Speaker 1: SNL's first choice. SNL had hired Chevy first and left
23:13
Speaker 1: Bill behind to sling crude jokes with the National Lampoon Show.
23:17
Speaker 1: SNL didn't want him until after Chevy left for Hollywood.
23:21
Speaker 1: And if he was Chevy's replacement and Chevy was medium talent,
23:25
Speaker 1: what did that make him? No, Bill didn't want to
23:29
Speaker 1: go there. His inner wise ass wouldn't even entertain the
23:32
Speaker 1: thought his own break was coming. He knew it, He
23:35
Speaker 1: just had to wait it out a little longer. His brother,
23:38
Speaker 1: Brian had been working on a film script for Ages
23:40
Speaker 1: and said he needed one more actor to round it out.
23:43
Speaker 1: Brian didn't even have a specific role for Bill yet,
23:46
Speaker 1: but He knew Bill could nail whatever was thrown his
23:48
Speaker 1: way better, yet he knew Bill would do it for cheap.
23:52
Speaker 1: The two brothers shook on it. Bill was going to
23:55
Speaker 1: be a movie star and everything was going to be
23:58
Speaker 1: all right. There was only one question that mattered at
24:05
Speaker 1: Rolling Hills in the summer of nineteen seventy nine, and
24:09
Speaker 1: it was this, Do you take drugs? Good? Good? Drugs
24:15
Speaker 1: were in high demand at the Florida Golf Club that season,
24:18
Speaker 1: not from their guests, from the camera crew. The club
24:20
Speaker 1: was foolish enough to allow on site to film Brian
24:23
Speaker 1: Murray's movie Caddyshack. Brian had written a movie about what
24:27
Speaker 1: he knew best, and that was life spent lugging clubs
24:30
Speaker 1: between the tea and the Fairway. He and Bill pocketed
24:33
Speaker 1: plenty of cash working as teenage caddies. Not unlike one
24:37
Speaker 1: of Caddyshack's main characters, Danny Newnan, Brian had a meager
24:42
Speaker 1: six million dollar budget to replicate his experiences for Hollywood,
24:46
Speaker 1: and the dollars were already dwindling thanks to an unending
24:49
Speaker 1: supply of cocaine to keep everyone feeling all right all
24:52
Speaker 1: the time. It started small, a little Bompierre and a
24:56
Speaker 1: quick hit there, and just a few grams at a time,
24:59
Speaker 1: but it was hard to curb the cast and cruise appetite.
25:03
Speaker 1: This wasn't just any old coke. This was a palate
25:06
Speaker 1: cleanser from the cheap stuff. It was pure, it was clean.
25:10
Speaker 1: It's like it was made to order straight from Colombia
25:12
Speaker 1: and directly up your nose. Overindulging was easy. Lines at
25:18
Speaker 1: lunchtime became normal. Quick bumps screwed to binges by the ounce,
25:23
Speaker 1: and the madness peaked when the cast and crew allegedly
25:26
Speaker 1: inhaled eighty grams of cocaine every week. And then there
25:30
Speaker 1: was the booze, and that was even easier to overdo.
25:35
Speaker 1: You needed the right vice for the right situation. Cocaine
25:39
Speaker 1: was powdered and energy. It kept you upright on long
25:42
Speaker 1: days getting down to the hard work of movie making.
25:45
Speaker 1: But alcohol was for killing time, especially when the elements
25:49
Speaker 1: in Florida trump the production schedule. Elements like category five hurricanes.
25:58
Speaker 1: Hurricane David ripped the path through the Dominican Republic where
26:01
Speaker 1: it's one hundred and twenty five mile per hour winds
26:04
Speaker 1: killed two thousand people and left one billion dollars worth
26:08
Speaker 1: of damage in its wake, and soon Hurricane David's eye
26:12
Speaker 1: would be staring down at Florida. So production on Caddyshack
26:16
Speaker 1: came to a halt. The party was over, sort of.
26:21
Speaker 1: The cast and crew fled to their rooms to board
26:23
Speaker 1: up their windows. They kept all the essentials in stock,
26:26
Speaker 1: clean water in the bathtub, extra batteries for power outages,
26:30
Speaker 1: and enough booze to last them through hurricane season. And
26:33
Speaker 1: the film's budget shrank yet again, and it was about
26:36
Speaker 1: to shrink even further. One of the film's biggest expenses
26:40
Speaker 1: would arrive soon and drained two hundred and fifty thousand
26:42
Speaker 1: dollars a week. Brian had wildly underestimated the cost of
26:47
Speaker 1: paying his brother, who was now counted as a mainstay
26:50
Speaker 1: on the SNL cast, and did not come as cheap
26:53
Speaker 1: as previously thought. Hurricane David passed over rolling hells, though
26:58
Speaker 1: without much harm, and before were too long, the ominous
27:01
Speaker 1: storm clouds would part and the Florida sun would beam
27:04
Speaker 1: over the golf course once again, just like that day
27:08
Speaker 1: years earlier, when Bill Murray stepped out of the Art
27:10
Speaker 1: Institute of Chicago and stepped into the light.
27:13
Speaker 3: It was a new day, a new beginning, Chevy.
27:43
Speaker 1: Chase stirred in bed. He looked at the clock in
27:46
Speaker 1: the nightstand three am. It was too early for this,
27:50
Speaker 1: and the knocking at his hotel door escalated to urgent banging.
27:54
Speaker 1: It was becoming clear that rolling over wasn't an option.
27:57
Speaker 1: Chevy stumbled to the door in the darkness. Two Murray's
28:01
Speaker 1: were on the other side. Bill and Brian didn't bother
28:04
Speaker 1: with pleasantries. Hey man got any grass? No, Chevy didn't
28:09
Speaker 1: have any grass on him. Caddy Shack was a cocaine crew.
28:13
Speaker 1: Weed was the light beer of this drug world. It
28:17
Speaker 1: was good enough, But why settle for good enough when
28:19
Speaker 1: you could get ghacked. The Murray brothers didn't budge from
28:23
Speaker 1: the doorway. If there was any bad blood left between
28:26
Speaker 1: Bill and Chevy, Bill seemed willing to put it behind
28:29
Speaker 1: him for the sake of getting stoned. Besides, the tension
28:32
Speaker 1: from their fight at Saturday Night Live had dissolved while
28:35
Speaker 1: shooting their low scene together in Caddyshack, You know, the
28:38
Speaker 1: one where Chevy's character Ty Webb is forced to enter
28:41
Speaker 1: the dingy boat of greenskeeper Carl Spackler. Spackler played by
28:45
Speaker 1: Bill Murray. Maybe it stroked Chevy's ego that he was
28:49
Speaker 1: playing the posh golf player while Bill took the role
28:52
Speaker 1: of a crooked mouth burnout living in his own filth.
28:55
Speaker 1: Bill even contributed to said filth directly. He provided the
28:58
Speaker 1: hustler centerfolds, the walls, and the tattered car seat to
29:02
Speaker 1: use his Carl's couch. It's really awful, Chevy's character says
29:05
Speaker 1: as he scans the shack right before Carl probably shows
29:08
Speaker 1: him a type of grass. He claims to have invented
29:11
Speaker 1: a hybrid of Kentucky bluegrass, featherbed bet and northern California
29:15
Speaker 1: since Amelia perfect for thirty six holes by day, even
29:19
Speaker 1: better for getting stone to the Jesus Belt at night.
29:23
Speaker 1: It was a phenomenal scene, but Bill needed the real
29:26
Speaker 1: thing right now, The unspoken question lingered in the air.
29:31
Speaker 1: All right, so who does have grass? Younger members of
29:34
Speaker 1: the crew, Maybe, No, it would be too cheap, like
29:37
Speaker 1: smoking trash. They didn't need to go down the chain
29:39
Speaker 1: in command. They had to go up right to the top.
29:42
Speaker 1: Chevy would be the gateway. He saw himself as the
29:45
Speaker 1: biggest source of star power in the entire movie, except
29:49
Speaker 1: for one man, Rodney Dangerfield. Now that was a man
29:54
Speaker 1: whose resume you really had to respect. He made so
29:57
Speaker 1: much bread headlining comedy shows and must Vegas that he
30:00
Speaker 1: actually lost money to step away and film Caddyshack. Rodney
30:05
Speaker 1: Dangerfield hustled hard, laughed hard, and partied even harder. When
30:09
Speaker 1: he first visited the film studio, he arrived in a
30:12
Speaker 1: bright blue leisure suit, pulled out a bag of coke,
30:15
Speaker 1: did two lines on the spot, and asked, where's the pussy?
30:19
Speaker 1: If anyone on set had drugs, it was Rodney who,
30:22
Speaker 1: luck would have It was just two doors down from Chevy.
30:25
Speaker 1: Bill and Brian let Chevy do the talking as the
30:28
Speaker 1: so called main star who could approach a comedy giant
30:31
Speaker 1: like Rodney Dangerfield. Rodney had some grass, all right, the
30:35
Speaker 1: good stuff, not the kindie gave away for free, even
30:38
Speaker 1: to cast mates. He'd need a fat water of cash
30:41
Speaker 1: for this stuff. Rodney pulled a plastic baggy from a
30:44
Speaker 1: suitcase to dangle under their noses. Bill and Brian phoned
30:48
Speaker 1: up a few hundred bucks between the two of them
30:49
Speaker 1: and walked away with rodney stash. It wasn't until they
30:53
Speaker 1: got into some decent lighting that they saw what they
30:55
Speaker 1: had actually just copped it was just a bag of seats.
31:00
Speaker 1: He sold them a glorified grow your own kit and
31:03
Speaker 1: the smart asses have been out smarted. One former drug
31:07
Speaker 1: dealer swindled. Some folks might have been pissed. Bill, Brian
31:11
Speaker 1: and Chevy just laughed it off. Apparently they still had
31:15
Speaker 1: a lot to learn. In a rare occurrence, three egos
31:19
Speaker 1: went up in smoke at Rolling Hills that night. Anything
31:23
Speaker 1: less would have been a disgrace, Tom Jake Brennan and
31:29
Speaker 1: this this disgrace slamp all right. This week's question of
31:44
Speaker 1: the week is which Bill Murray performance from which film
31:47
Speaker 1: is your favorite? And why there are so many iconic
31:51
Speaker 1: options life aquatics, stripes lost in translation, and also if
31:56
Speaker 1: you have any Bill Murray experiences, if he's ever served
31:59
Speaker 1: you a drinker, crash to your house, party in Brooklyn,
32:01
Speaker 1: or pet your dog. Whatever I want to know about it,
32:04
Speaker 1: Hit me up, let me know and we will discuss
32:06
Speaker 1: in this week's after Party Bonus episode six one seven
32:10
Speaker 1: nine oh six sixty six three eight. Leave me a voicemail,
32:13
Speaker 1: send me a text. You can also reach me at
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