How Ryan Reynolds Wrangled The Unpredictable Bill Murray For John Candy's Documentary

If you ever want to contact the great Bill Murray, there is a 1-800 number that will put you in semi-direct contact with the comedy superstar. A friend entrusted me with the number years ago when I was writing a piece that would've been boosted by the legendary actor's input. I phoned Bill Murray twice. He never returned my calls. Perhaps my pitching skills were off. Maybe I should've reminded him of the time we tied one on at Café des Artistes in 2005.

Regardless, Murray is notoriously slippery, even if you get him in the room. A producer of note once told me they pitched him the "Press Your Luck" movie — which was eventually made as "The Luckiest Man in America" starring Paul Walter Hauser — over lunch at a New York City eatery. Midway through the meeting, Murray excused himself to use the restroom. When he'd been absent for 10 minutes, the producer went to check on him in the men's room. The room was empty, and the window was wide open.

It doesn't matter who you are. If Murray's unsure about working with you, he will put you through the wringer. Ryan Reynolds discovered this when he was trying to secure the "Saturday Night Live" alum for an interview in the Colin Hanks-directed documentary "John Candy: I Like Me." You'd think a movie star of Reynolds' magnitude could pull off an agent-to-agent contact and knock out that interview easy-peasy. Murray just doesn't work that way. And /Film's Ethan Anderton, while attending a Chicago Q&A for the documentary, learned this first-hand.

When asked during the Q&A about tracking down Murray, Reynolds mentioned that the star used to be reachable primarily via fax. He then found an acquaintance who had Murray's phone number. Per Reynolds:

"I said to that person, 'Look, I don't want to implicate you, so I need you to give me the number via a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend.' And he did that. So eventually someone called me and gave me his phone number, and the outgoing voicemail was to a Greek shipping company. I believed it. Boy howdy, that was authentic."

I did not get the Greek shipping company message (perhaps a reference to "The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou") when I called Murray. I just got a beep, at which point I hastily left my message. I did not, however, leave somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 to 50 messages. Reynolds did, and he finally got a call from Murray while he was walking into a gala. Reynolds took the call, and it did not go well.

Murray pointedly asked Reynolds who was "the godfather of the spit-take." Folks, there's one answer here. It's Toledo, Ohio's own Danny Thomas. Alas, Reynolds overthought the question. "I'm very lucky," he said. "When I was younger, I had a friend who, from vaudeville forward, he basically gave me the comedy history university all the way through Jack Benny and all that kind of stuff, and I was very grateful for that. So I said, 'That'd be Desi Arnaz, Bill.'" Unsatisfied with Reynolds' answer, Murray hung up.

Reynolds finally resorted to corralling his kids to record a video where they helped him plead with Murray to do the interview. This broke through Murray's defenses, and he ended up giving the interview that ties the documentary together.

So if you ever need to interview Bill Murray, and you're lucky enough to get his phone number, hound the ol' dog. But maybe don't tell him you're Ryan Reynolds.