No one crashes a party like Bill Murray. The über-eccentric actor, who's always followed his own kooky muse, has developed a humorous habit in recent years of popping by unannounced at other people's festivities.
Tales of Murray's penchant for party crashing have spread like wildfire online, such as stories about how he's invaded a private karaoke room in New York City, hung out with Brooklyn hipsters, or pounded beers and sat in with the band during a house show in Austin during SXSW week in 2010.
And if a story on website Super Official News is to be believed, Murray's about to embark on a nationwide party crashing tour across the country, which will supposedly kick off in the Valley next month. According to the post, Murray will drop by parties in 27 different cities starting off in Phoenix on August 1 before hitting up some major rager in Scottsdale on August 2.
Too bad it's all a big joke.
While we'd give anything to have the man who played Peter Venkman and Steve Zissou hang out at our backyard barbecue, the story is one of numerous Christwire-like satirical stories that Super Official News regularly crafts. (Just last month, for instance, the humor site reported that Sheriff Joe Arpaio was launching a bath salts task force.)
In a nice touch, the story includes a few staged pictures of Valley residents posting makeshift cardboard signs outside their houses declaring "Bill Murray Can Crash Here."
A dead giveaway that the "Bill Murray Party Crashing Tour" is a gag is that the 24-hour hotline number listed in the story (785-273-0325) is actually the digits for the infamous Westboro Baptist Church in Kansas.
Proving that odd maxim about how "if it's on the Internet, it must be true" is still valid, a few Valley people may have been hooked by the story.
Cameraman Lee Lusby posted "PHX is first!" on his Facebook page along with a link to Super Official News, to which No Festival Required's Steve Weiss replied "Oh boy. Oh boy. Oh boy." Meanwhile, one local lass named Paula Tesoriero asked on Twitter last night, "Please someone that I know in phoenix have a party so that bill murray can crash it."
And hipster DJ Aaron Hempsey seemed to be perturbed that Bill Murray would visit Phoenix in the middle of summer: "Uh, August 1st. Outrageous.. Maybe we can convince him to skip Scottsdale and spend 2 nights in Phoenix," Hempsey wrote on Facebook.
A few minutes later, however, he realized something was amiss, noting that "some of the other headlines on this website suggest this is bogus information." (Don't feel bad Aaron, we were hoping against hope too.)
Oddly enough, some folks have decided to throw some Bill Murray parties even if the tour ain't happening. Jewelry artist Heidi Abrahamson is holding one such fete on August 1 at Metro Retro, ostensibly to get the actor to stop by. As such, there will be karaoke involved.
When asked on Facebook if the party was real and if Murray might show up, Abrahamson replied "Who knows for sure! Like I said, it'll be a great party with or with out him!!"
