Aziz Ansari Addresses 2022 Bill Murray Misconduct Allegations on Set of His Film

Aziz Ansari has broken his silence on the controversy surrounding Bill Murray, resulting from a 2022 incident that allegedly occurred during the production of Ansari’s movie Being Mortal.

Speaking about Murray’s alleged misconduct on the set of his film, Ansari, 42, told The Hollywood Reporter that the actor, 74, “was devastated” about the claims.

“He couldn’t believe it happened. I think this movie meant a lot to him,” Ansari added of Murray.

Murray was accused of misconduct by a younger female crew member in April 2022, and he reportedly reached a settlement of just over $100,000 with the accuser that October.

A report published at the time claimed that Murray “straddled” the woman on a prop bed and kissed her on the mouth through masks worn for on-set COVID safety protocol.

The incident resulted in an internal on-set investigation, and the Ansari-led project, which was being produced by the Disney-owned Searchlight Pictures, was ultimately suspended indefinitely. 

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In a candid interview with The New York Times published in April, Murray said he felt “barbecued” by the experience — despite saying he had tried to “make peace” with the affected parties.

“I don’t go too many days or weeks without thinking of what happened. … I dunno what prompted me to do it,” the Groundhog Day actor said. “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.”

“I was wearing a mask, and I gave her a kiss, and she was wearing a mask. It wasn’t like I touched her, but it was just, I gave her a kiss through a mask. And she wasn’t a stranger,” Murray recalled, adding that he ate lunch with the person “on various days of the week.”

When asked whether he thought he’d learned anything from the experience, the Ghostbusters star responded, “I think so. You can teach an old dog new tricks.”

“But it was a great disappointment, because I thought I knew someone, and I did not,” Murray added. “I certainly thought it was light. I thought it was funny. 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.”

After production on Being Mortal halted amid the accusations against Murray, “Everybody’s texting me, ‘Oh, Aziz, I’m so sorry,’ ” Ansari told THR in his recent interview. “And I said, ‘Oh God, I can’t live in this woe-is-me moment.’ ”

Enter Good Fortune, Ansari’s upcoming feature directorial debut that he also wrote and costars in with Seth Rogen and Keanu Reeves, who feature in the THR issue alongside Ansari.

Instead of wallowing in the wake of his canned project, “I called Seth,” Ansari told the outlet. “I said, ‘Hey, I know you’re supposed to be filming Being Mortal, so you’re free today. This is a s—-y day for me. If you want to help me, read this, tell me if you want to do it.’ “

Also starring Keke Palmer and Sandra Oh, Good Fortune follows a “well-meaning but rather inept angel named Gabriel” who “meddles in the lives of a struggling gig worker (Ansari) and a wealthy venture capitalist (Rogen, 43).” Reeves, 61, plays Ansari’s “budget guardian angel.”

In the joint THR interview, Rogen recalled, “We were saying as we were making it, ‘If this movie does nothing else, I hope maybe people tip their DoorDash a little bit more after they watch it.’ ”

“Because one bad review — someone’s annoyed that they didn’t put the sauce in the thing — can really f— your s— up,” he added. “We found very comedic ways to do it, but it’s very real, and you haven’t really yet seen something from that person’s perspective.”

Good Fortune premieres Saturday, Sept. 6, at the Toronto International Film Festival, and is in theaters Oct. 17.