Bill Murray, the Baseball Game, and Sasquatches Big Foot
I was in the middle of writing an entire story that revolved around Bill Murray. One of the methods I used to stay on top of any developments, interviews, articles, ect. was to set up a Google alert. If you’ve never used those suckers, they’re pretty cool. Basically, you set a keyword you’re interested in, and Google will email you once day with latest developments.
It was July 26, 2012 around 5pm. I got home from work and was swapping out my wife to hang out with my son while she went to teach ballet. About 20 minutes after being home I was casually looking over my emails whilst my son got in his daily Baby Einstein fix. My jaw dropped. I see a google alert linking to an article from a Salt Lake City news station, titled – Bill Murray Drops in for a Trappers celebration. It read:
SALT LAKE CITY — The Salt Lake Bees are honoring the 25th anniversary of the Salt Lake City Trappers’ 29th consecutive win, and you’ll never believe who was there to take part in the celebration. Actor/comedian Bill Murray, who was one of the owners of the Trappers, stopped by Spring Mobile Ballpark Thursday afternoon. Murray, while speaking with FOX 13, says being part owner of the Trappers was an experience that ranks up there with some of his past roles like Peter Venkman from Ghostbusters and Carl Spackler from Caddyshack.
“At the top Steve, it’s number one,” Murray says mistaking sports reporter Rick Aaron’s name. “I’m sorry Rick, I’m just thinking about the streak.” Murray recalls how the team rose up and dominated the minor league circuit bringing a lot of attention to Salt Lake City. The Trappers’ record streak brought them national coverage on ABC’s Wide World of Sports and got them a spread in Sports Illustrated magazine.
“’85 was the first year here, we won the championship then — we won in ’86, we won in ’87 and from then on they were out to get us, the Major League organizations hated us. It was a blood feud,” said former Trappers part-owner Van Schley. “People said you couldn’t have baseball in Salt Lake and we proved that you could,” said Murray. When asked after 25 years having passed, what he thought about seeing the baseball players and crew again, Murray replied: “Everyone looks exactly the same.”
I became frantic. After all this trying to hunt the man down, he was 45 minutes away from me. It is so funny how in moments like these how I told myself that it must be a sign. I knew the odds of actually getting to talk to him at the ballpark were slim, but I had to take the chance. I called my wife, she got her ballet buns home and I rushed off. First stop was my office. I decided the best thing to do was to print off what I had of GBM and hope that it was enough for him to see it was a great idea.
I put the script in an envelope and wrote a little letter explaining that the story revolved around him, though it wasn’t finished – but I had to take the chance since he was in town. Another “sign” that this was all meant to be was earlier that day a coworker had given me a manila envelope that I didn’t end up needing – it now became the holder of precious papers that would soon hopefully find their way into Bill Murray’s hands.
I got up to Salt Lake in record time, bought myself a ticket to the game and walked in. The game had already been going for awhile, and I paced the entire park several times. I couldn’t see Bill anywhere and after about 25 minutes I started to figure it was hopeless to keep looking. Then, I heard someone singing. What in the love is that?
It was Bill Murray singing take me out to the ball game. He was up on the teleprompter surrounded by hoards of people, but as hard as I tried I could not manage to see where he was in the crowd. He stopped singing, the crowd went wild and the game continued. Still I could not spot him anywhere. Well that’s it. So much for signs and meant to be’s.
Sasquatch Saves the Day
I sat down on a step and started watching the game a little. Looking to my left there was a guy in a wheelchair with a big old leg/foot cast, who also resembled a Sasquatch in sight and smell. I laughingly blurted out, “Bill Murray.” Sasquatch said, “Ha ha, yeah.” I looked deeply into the beast’s eyes and somehow I knew that he knew something. He knew more than just great places to relieve yourself in the forest – he knew where Bill was. So I said “Where is he anyway?” Maimed of his key characteristic, Sasquatch man motioned with his head to the south west and said “Up there.” And up there Bill was indeed. Thanks hairy one.
My heart immediately began to fail and then overexert itself to compensate. It did this over and over again until I walked right up to Bill. He was surrounded by people wanting a picture, or an autograph. I waited for a moment until eventually he turned my way and he took the papers out of my hand figuring I wanted an autograph. He started reading the note and said “What’s this?” I responded by saying absolutely nothing.
Let’s back up a bit now at this point.
The Autograph Mentality
I believe myself to be a grounded person. I’ve met some celebrities and I don’t feel star struck. I feel respect for their craft, and I am happy to meet them – however simply saying “Hey love your movies” seems so hollow. I gave into that mentality once when John Cusack was in the Salt Lake City airport and my wife and I happened to have Serendipity on DVD in our luggage (I’m sure there was an action movie or something in their too, sheesh lay off). We asked him for a signature.
He was annoyed as he was trying to be covert, and he ran out of there as fast as he could after signing the DVD. I felt all weird. I don’t want to diss you if you are one of those people that loves getting autographs, there is nothing inherently wrong with it – but I can’t get into it. Especially with Bill because I really do respect his work, and if I could ever be a good enough writer and filmmaker I would be deeply honored to work with the guy. What good does an autograph do for that? I also got the feeling that night at the ballpark that Bill really just wanted to watch the game, and that is hard to do when people are surrounding you begging for crap.
Face to Face With The Man
As Bill read my note and I said nothing I saw his brother Brian Doyle behind him, and while I have seen BD Murray in a lot of movies and television shows, I had flashbacks of the classic Wayne’s World and “a sphincter says what?”
Bill then looked up and very clearly stated “You are talking to me about an unfinished script? I oughta slap you upside the face.“ Many of the people around him snickered. Balls. What do I say to that? I suddenly felt like I was 13 in a school cafeteria. The most popular kid in school just made fun of me and the entire lunchroom of kids thought it was hilarious. An adolescent henchman smashes a corn dog up in my grill and pours and carton of chocolate milk down my pants. What a waste.
I muttered something like “well you were in town… and I had to shle-schlooy-hag-rubby-frig-bik. His response to my note totally caught me off guard. Did Bill Murray really just say that he “oughta slap me upside the face?” Yes Wes, yes he did. He then gave me a semi-annoyed look, nodded, put the papers under his arm, and turned away from me. Not exactly a win.
As far as I know Bill gave the script to the Big Foot and it is still being used as toilet paper somewhere in the rocky mountain forests today. Wherever you are Sasquatch, you’re alright dude. Surely Mr. Big Foot, your big foot has healed by now and you are off confusing people about your whereabouts just like your good old buddy Bill Murray.
I have wondered everyday since if Bill ever even glanced at GBM or got a general idea of the vision. Hindsight is a vicious piece of Sasquatch crap man. The days following that encounter I realized how stupid it was to give Bill an unfinished story. It would have been much more professional to have written down the synopsis and the vision of the film in a letter and ask if he would ever be interested. Needless to say, but here I go writing it down anyway – I never heard back from Bill.
Epic letdown? 100%. Please send me your grand mommies best cookie recipes.
But… and this is a big-huge-Big-Foot-butt, I have a couple other Bill Murray stories worth sharing. I even have the audacity to claim I have one of the coolest BM stories you’ve ever heard, mostly because it is meaningful. So stay tuned for that story down the road.
VIDEO version of this episode HERE
PODCAST version of this episode HERE
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