Background
Bill Murray was born on 21 September 1950 in Wilmette, Illinois, United States.
Bill Murray was born on 21 September 1950 in Wilmette, Illinois, United States.
During his teen years he was the lead singer of a rock band called the Dutch Masters and took part in high school and community theater.
After graduating, Murray attended Regis University in Denver, Colorado, taking pre-medical courses. He quickly dropped out, returning to Illinois. (Decades later, in 2007, Regis awarded him an honorary Doctor of Humanities degree.)
He was a founding member of the Second City' team in Chicago before he made it on Saturday Night Live. He did a voice on Shame of the Jungle (75, Picha and Boris Szulzinger) before he appeared in Meatballs (79, Ivan Reitman); Caddyshack (80, Harold Ramis); Where the Buffalo Roam (80, Art Linson); Loose Shoes (80, Ira Miller); in the army in Stripes (81, Reitman); Nothing Lasts Forever (82, Tom Schiller); very funny as the friend in Tootsie (82, Sydney Pollack); with a huge hit in Ghostbusters (84, Reitman); acting in and coscreenwriter on the listless The Razors Edge (84, John Byrum)—a sudden revelation of disquiet; Little Shop of Horrors (86, Frank Oz); Scrooged (88, Richard Donner); Ghostbusters II (89, Reitman); Quick Change (90. Howard Franklin and Murray), a failure, yet a promising debut; What About Bob? (91, Oz); maybe his best work yet—Groundhog Day (93, Ramis); and standing up to De Niro as the gangster in Mad Dog and Glory (93, John McNaughton).
An intriguing pattern began to emerge—give him a big, obvious comedy, with himself in the lead, and it was likely to Hop: Larger Than Life (96, Howard Franklin); The Man Who Knew Too Little (97, Jon Amiel)—but put him in a modest role, here or there, and invariably yon wondered why no one really gives Bill Murray his head: Ed Wood (94, Tim Burton); Kingpin (96. Bobby and Peter Farrellv); Wild Things (98, McNaughton); Rushmore (98, Wes Anderson). Is there really something in the man that hates to be exposed? Will any big movie ever trap him? He gives chances: With Friends Like These (98, Philip F. Messina); Cradle Will Rock (99, Tim Robbins); Scout’s Honor (99, Neil Leifer); Polonius in Hamlet (00, Michael Almereyda); Charlie’s Angels (00, McG); Osmosis Jones (01, the Farrellys); The Royal Tenenbaums (01, Anderson).
Of all the people who made their reputation with Saturday Night Live in the late 1970s, Murray has worked hardest with a movie career, and seemed the most open to the challenge of acting. Not that he is unfunny: indeed, as so often in film, it is those who are merely inhabiting a difficult position (up a tree or at the dead end of argument) who have the best chance of being funny. Murray is ambitious and adventurous, and he seems set on perseverance with less and less stress on mannerism or mania.
Married Margaret Kelly in 1980.