Of all the roles that Bill Murray has played in his career, Ernie McCracken is easily in my top five. The funny thing is that Bill Murray is rarely if ever upstaged in a movie. I’m not saying anyone upstaged Murray in Kingpin but I will say that something did: His hair. I don’t think I’ve ever laughed as hard in the theater as I did during the final showdown between he and Woody Harrelson in that film. Speaking of the final showdown, there’s a little known fact about the last 3 strikes that Bill Murry rolls.
According to Uproxx’s article that goes into facts about Kingpin, it’s said that:
While they played closely matched rivals in Kingpin, Bill Murray and Woody Harrelson were not exactly equals on the lanes in real life. Harrelson was a notoriously terrible bowler, so bad that a bowling coach had to be brought in to change his game. However, this attempt was to no avail, so stand-ins were used.
On the other side of the coin, Bill Murray had a natural knack, and the three strikes that he bowls in the final showdown at the million dollar tournament were actually real. While the crowd was supposed to be for Big Ern, they were really for Murray. Understandably.
I mean yeah. Have you watched this movie? Harrelson is absolutely awful, which is odd because he had decent skills in White Men Can’t Jump. But as we know, Bill Murray has some natural athletic ability. P.S. this is one incredible 9 minute plus clip. Wow.
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