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Bill Murray Agreed to Voice ‘Garfield’ Because of a Misunderstanding (So He Say)

According to Murray, he didn’t realize who he’d signed up to work with

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Despite being a commercial success, 2004’s Garfield: The Movie was by no means critically acclaimed. On the day of the film’s release, Chris Kaltenbach of The Baltimore Sun wrote, “Garfield the comic strip stopped being funny about 10 years ago. Garfield: The Movie makes it to about the 10-minute mark before tedium sets in.” Ann Hornaday shared similar sentiments in her review for The Washington Post, calling the movie “bland, workmanlike and instantly forgettable.”

By 2009, Bill Murray, who voiced Garfield in the film, joined in on the bashing. When he made a cameo appearance as himself in Zombieland that year, Murray was asked by one character if he had any regrets, to which he replied, “Garfield, maybe”:

In an interview with GQ from the following year, it was suggested that money might’ve factored into Murray’s decision to do Garfield, and he responded like so: “Well, not completely. I thought it would be kind of fun, because doing a voice is challenging, and I’d never done that. Plus, I looked at the script, and it said, ‘So-and-so and Joel Coen.’ And I thought, ‘Christ, well I love those Coens! They’re funny.’” It would appear, based on his explanation, that Murray had mistaken the film’s screenwriter, Joel Cohen, with Joel Coen of the Coen brothers, who wrote and directed such films as Fargo and The Big Lebowski.

Murray continued, saying that while he was recording his dialogue for Garfield, “the lines got worse and worse. And I said, ‘Okay, you better show me the whole rest of the movie, so we can see what we’re dealing with.’ So I sat down and watched the whole thing, and I kept saying, ‘Who the hell cut this thing? Who did this? What the f–k was Coen thinking?’ And then they explained it to me: It wasn’t written by that Joel Coen.”

During a Reddit AMA in 2014, Murray told the same story about misunderstanding who the writer was. However, the film’s co-writer, Alec Sokolow, chimed in under Murray’s message to refute the claim, writing, “As one of the ‘guilty’ writing entities to both Garfield movies, I must tell you this answer, much like Bill’s ADR seems to be made up as the words leave his mouth. He knew it was not Joel Coen well before he met Joel Cohen. It’s a funny take. And it kind of defends him against the criticism of making such an overtly commercial film. But, it’s complete horse s–t. I loved his Zombieland line as well. But, if it’s his biggest regret, why did he do it twice?”

Regarding Murray “doing it twice,” Sokolow was of course referencing the fact that Murray also voiced Garfield in the 2006 sequel Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties, which was once again written by Cohen and Sokolow. Murray didn’t respond to Sokolow’s Reddit comment, but Sokolow closed off his statement by saying, “Happy to sign my name as I would be to meet Mr. Murray anywhere to continue the conversation.”

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