Bill Murray Says Bob Woodward Should Answer for ‘Tearing Down’ John Belushi: ‘I Read Five Pages and Went, Oh My God, They Framed Nixon’

Legendary Hollywood actor Bill Murray trashed Bob Woodward during an appearance on The Joe Rogan Experience, challenging the author’s work after delving into just a few pages of Wired: The Short Life & Fast Times of John Belushi, Woodward’s 1984 tome chronicling the life of John Belushi.

Murray was clearly underwhelmed by Woodward’s attempt to capture the character of his friend and fellow actor Belushi, claiming Woodward’s lackadaisical relationship with the facts could easily have been transposed into his work as a Washington Post reporter in the early 1907s that helped topple U.S. President Richard Nixon via the Watergate scandal..

“When I read ‘Wired’—the book written by, what’s his name, Woodward—about Belushi, I read like five pages, and I went, ‘Oh my God. They framed Nixon,’” Murray said.

The comedian and actor was appalled by what he saw as inaccurate reporting and believes Woodward should answer for it.

“If this is what he writes about my friend that I’ve known for half of my adult life—which is completely inaccurate—talking to the people of the outer circle getting the story, what the hell could they have done to Nixon?”

Murray admitted he didn’t read the whole book but enough of what he did left him suitably underwhelmed.

“I acknowledge I only read five pages, but the five pages I read made me want to set fire to the whole thing,” he said. “Those five pages, I went, ‘If he did this to Belushi, what he did to Nixon is probably soiled for me, too.’”

Murray further took issue with Woodward’s sourcing, arguing the journalist relied on people who weren’t close to Belushi.

“The two sources that he had, if he had them for Wired, were so far outside the inner circle that it was criminal. Cruel.”

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