Late movie icon Val Kilmer has been called “the worst human being I have ever known” by a director he worked with.
Conspiracy director Adam Marcus laid into the star, who died from pneumonia at the age of 65 last year, in a scathing social media post on Monday.
“#MicroIntellectMonday to that time when I directed that guy. The guy who played Iceman and Doc Holiday [sic]. You know the one. Here’s me and the Putz working it out on the set of Conspiracy,” he said, sharing a picture of him and the Heat actor in a now-deleted Threads post, first reported by Entertainment Weekly.
He then called out anyone who might be angered by his words, seemingly anticipating backlash.
“And to any of you rolling your eyes because of the whole ‘don’t speak ill of the dead bulls--t,’ f--- that,” he said, adding that if he “did one-tenth of what he did on my set today, he would have been canceled in a blink.”
He added that he was the “Worst human being I’ve ever known… and that is really saying something.”
Joel Schumacher also expressed concern about Kilmer the year after directing him in Batman Forever in 1995.
Speaking to Entertainment Weekly in 1996, he called the Top Gun star “childish and impossible” and described him as a “psychologically disturbed human being.”
Kilmer addressed the criticism in Rolling Stone in 2003, saying, “I’ve been careless about how I viewed my business. But I trust that the truth is the truth and a lie is a lie. Frankenheimer, bless him, he passed on, but he had a history of being mean about people.
“Schumacher’s not a great director by any stretch, but he makes everyone happy, he makes money. But his version of me being unstable—he’s very smart, he can’t say anything about work, because then I can sue him for slander.”
Kilmer continued, “The idea is that I’m not responsible. About what? Doing homework? Representing the character? Making money? I’ve made my employers over a billion dollars. I didn’t really set out to do that, but I’m very proud that I’ve consistently made money.”
