Small, Baby Steps: The World According to Bill Murray

What we can all learn from one of the most prominent men in comedy

“Are you afraid of death?” said a little preadolescent voice.

The man’s eyes grew large, alarmed. He pauses for a moment before answering, “Yes.”

Both are tucked in bed, at a summer vacation home in New Hampshire, the scene of a 1991 Bill Murray film called What About Bob? whose cast includes Richard Dreyfuss and Julie Hagerty. The boy in the scene is Siggy, the son of a successful psychiatrist named Dr. Leo Marvin, played by Richard Dreyfuss, who, unbeknownst to him, agreed to take on Bill Murray’s character — Bob Wiley — as a patient without knowing just how needy he was.

But before we can get to the point where Siggy asks Bob an existential question about death, let’s take a step back and learn more about Bob Wiley, or specifically the way Bill Murray portrayed him.

Bob Wiley is an everything-phobe. He’s afraid of germs, of going outside, of getting in elevators, of death, of getting Tourette’s syndrome, of losing his beloved fish. Just about everything that exists in the world outside of his apartment, he’s afraid of. “I’m fine as long as I’m in my apartment,” he says during the first meeting between him and Dr. Marvin.

Dr. Marvin is what you would call a “typical psychiatrist” of the day. He just published a self-help book called “Baby Steps” to guide people towards obtaining a…