Lucy Liu Recalls Standing Up to Charlie’s Angels Costar Bill Murray

Lucy Liu has no regrets about standing up for herself to costar Bill Murray on the set of the 2000 action film Charlie’s Angels.

“I really didn’t think about it. I would have done that in any situation,” Liu, 56, shared in an interview with The Guardian published on Monday, January 13. “I think when I sense something is not right, I am going to protect myself. It’s an innate thing to do if you feel there’s injustice, and I always feel that way.”

Liu previously accused Murray, 74, of using “inexcusable and unacceptable” language while working together on the movie in a July 2021 interview on the Los Angeles Times’ “Asian Enough” podcast.

“As we’re doing the scene, Bill starts to sort of hurl insults, and I won’t get into the specifics, but it kept going on and on. I was, like, ‘Wow, he seems like he’s looking straight at me,’” she alleged at the time. “I couldn’t believe that [the comments] could be towards me, because what do I have to do with anything majorly important at that time? I literally do the look around my shoulder thing, like, who is he talking to behind me? I say, ‘I’m so sorry. Are you talking to me?’ And clearly he was, because then it started to become a one-on-one communication.”

She went on to note that she had “nothing against Bill Murray” and had even run into him at a Saturday Night Live reunion event. “He came up to me and was perfectly nice,” she stated. “But I’m not going to sit there and be attacked.” (Us Weekly reached out to Murray’s reps for comment at the time.)

Liu’s comments came years after rumors swirled that the actress and Murray clashed on the Charlie’s Angels set. “Look, I will dismiss you completely if you are unprofessional and working with me,” Murray told the Times of London of the feud speculation in 2009.

In her Monday interview with The Guardian, Liu noted that she would have walked “a much easier road” in Hollywood if she didn’t speak up for herself.

“But because I’ve never been that person, we had to find a way,” she explained. “I think there has never been an easy road, for me and for us — and I say ‘us,’ because I really think it’s a group effort,” she added, referring to her fellow Asian American actors in the industry. “I would never take credit. My career has not been paved by myself.”

Liu reprised her role as Alex Munday in Charlie’s Angels’ 2003 sequel, Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle. Murray, meanwhile, did not return as the titular secret spies’ supervisor, John Bosley, but was replaced by Bernie Mac as the character’s adoptive brother, Jimmy Bosley.

Costar Drew Barrymore vocalized support for Liu following her 2021 comments against Murray. “What really happened was Bill was just in a — you know, comedians can be a little dark sometimes — and he just came in in a bad mood, and what you have to know is how much Lucy stood up for herself and that was the great thing that came out of an unfortunate circumstance,” Barrymore, 49, said on an October 2021 episode of her eponymous talk show. “She literally said, ‘I do not accept that kind of behavior from you.’ And we all supported her and backed her up and we moved forward.”

Noting that she was “proud” of Liu, Barrymore continued: “I respected [Lucy] then, I respect her now,” she said. “We dealt with it right then and there, we were strong and we moved forward and we didn’t accept anything less moving forward.”