Director Adam Marcus has shared his unflattering view of late Top Gun star Val Kilmer following the actor’s death in 2025.
Marcus, 58, previously worked with Kilmer on the 2008 action-thriller Conspiracy, a film that drew strong reviews at the time.
In the movie, Kilmer played William MacPherson, a disabled Iraq War veteran who uncovers a scheme targeting undocumented immigrants in Arizona after his friend — and his friend’s family — vanish.
The Batman Forever actor died on April 1 from pneumonia, aged 65, after being diagnosed with throat cancer in 2014.
Although he later recovered, complications from a tracheostomy damaged his vocal cords, prompting him to step back from acting and devote more time to his artwork.
Kilmer’s final screen credit came in Top Gun: Maverick (2022), where he returned as Tom “Iceman” Kazansky.
After Kilmer’s passing, many industry figures remembered him fondly — but Marcus did not join in with the tributes and instead made clear he had a very different experience.
Entertainment Weekly reports that Marcus posted a Threads update featuring a photo of the two of them on the set of Conspiracy, suggesting the collaboration was anything but pleasant.
“#MicroIntellectMonday to that time when I directed that guy. The guy who played Iceman and Doc Holiday. You know the one,” Marcus wrote. “Here’s me and the Putz working it out on the set of Conspiracy. So yeah, that happened.”
He added: “And to any of you rolling your eyes because of the whole ‘don’t speak ill of the dead bulls,’ f*** that,” he said. “[If] this guy did one-tenth of what he did on my set today, he would have been cancelled in a blink.”
“Worst human being I’ve ever known… and that is really saying something,” Marcus concluded before they disappeared from his profile.
Marcus is not the only filmmaker to have publicly criticised Kilmer over the years. Batman Forever director Joel Schumacher once described him as ‘childish and impossible’ and a ‘psychologically disturbed human being’ in comments made about a year after the film’s release.
Director John Frankenheimer, who worked with Kilmer on The Island of Dr. Moreau, also said he would never work with him again.
In Kilmer’s 2021 documentary Val, the actor addressed his reputation and acknowledged moments where his conduct may have been difficult.
He said: “I have behaved poorly. I have behaved bravely. I have behaved bizarrely to some. I deny none of this and have no regrets because I have lost and found parts of myself that I never knew existed. And I am blessed.”