Director Adam Marcus Launches Scathing Attack on Late Val Kilmer, Calling Him “Worst Human Being I’ve Ever Known”

Film director Adam Marcus has sparked controversy after publicly criticising the late Val Kilmer, more than a year after the acclaimed actor’s death, describing him as the worst person he has ever encountered in his career.

In posts shared on Threads on May 31, Marcus, 58, reflected on his experience directing Kilmer in the 2008 action thriller ‘Conspiracy’, referring to the actor with a derogatory term while sharing a behind-the-scenes photo from the set.

“Here’s me and the Putz working it out on the set of Conspiracy. So yeah, that happened,” Marcus wrote, according to Entertainment Weekly.

In Conspiracy, Kilmer played William “Spooky” MacPherson, a disabled Iraq War veteran who uncovers a corporate conspiracy targeting undocumented immigrants after travelling to Arizona to visit a friend who has mysteriously vanished.

Anticipating public backlash for speaking ill of a deceased figure, Marcus defiantly stood by his remarks. “And to any of you rolling your eyes because of the whole ‘don’t speak ill of the dead’ — f— that,” he wrote. “If this guy did one-tenth of what he did on my set today, he would have been cancelled in a blink.”

He went further, adding, “Worst human being I’ve ever known… and that is really saying something.”
The posts have since been deleted.

Val Kilmer, celebrated for iconic roles in ‘Top Gun’, ‘Tombstone’ and ‘Batman Forever’, died on April 1, 2025, from pneumonia. He was 65.