Two Years of Bill Murray Stories: A Look Back

Earlier this week, I realized that Bill Murray Stories has now been online for over two years. I originally started this site on a whim, a few days after a conversation with some friends about the “Bill Murray story phenomenon“, which I had not heard of at the time.

For a while, we would tell stories about “something crazy that just happened the other day” or “years ago when I was on vacation with my family…” They would all invariably involve Bill Murray doing something crazy, although none of them was true. When I started this site, all of the stories I wrote were also untrue. I have never met or seen the man in person.

After a while, I got tired of writing them. After all, how long can a person write fictional stories about a real person doing crazy things in real life? Writing even one story and creating a website around that idea is, in and of itself, a fairly odd concept. Then again, this is the internet, right?

Around the time I stopped writing these stories, people began sending them in. I would occasionally read stories about Bill Murray doing unbelievable things for real and think “if they hadn’t gotten a picture, I never would believe it“. As readers of this site continued sending in their own stories, I realized that many of them seem plausible.

But which Bill Murray stories are true? The answer is that I don’t know and, in the end, isn’t that the point? I have come to realize that, in its own weird way, this site is a Bill Murray fan site. Yes, he is a renowned actor and skilled comedian, but I get the impression he is also a personable and unpretentious guy. I am sure he has worked hard (to say the least) to be where he is, and the day-to-day must be tough sometimes, but he does it in style. He is Bill fucking Murray, he knows it, and it seems like he has fun with it – while making it look effortless. Isn’t that the true definition of a legend?

In addition to the many stories that have been submitted (which I will be posting over the next couple of weeks), I also received a link to a real Bill Murray Story, as told at a West Chester Story Slam event (thanks Jim). I think watching and hearing someone tell his or her story makes it that much better, so I thought I’d share.