The late Val Kilmer received an outpouring of fond remembrances following his death last year, but those positive feelings do not extend to one of his former collaborators.
Adam Marcus, who directed Kilmer in the 2008 direct-to-DVD thriller Conspiracy, laid into the fallen star in a Threads post on Sunday night, according to Entertainment Weekly. In the post, which he appears to have since deleted, Marcus labeled the actor – who died at 65 in April 2025 from pneumonia following a battle with cancer – the 'worst human being I've ever known.'
'#MicroIntellectMonday to that time when I directed that guy,' Marcus reportedly wrote while posting a photo of himself and Kilmer together. '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.'
Marcus had a prebuttal on deck for anyone who would object to him attacking Kilmer once he was not able to defend himself. 'And to any of you rolling your eyes because of the whole "don’t speak ill of the dead bulls***", f*** that,' he wrote.
He added that if Kilmer had done 'one-tenth of what he did on my set today, he would have been canceled in a blink.' Marcus concluded his post by writing, 'Worst human being I’ve ever known… and that is really saying something.'
Conspiracy and Collaborator Complaints
Kilmer starred in Conspiracy as William 'Spooky' MacPherson, a disabled special operations Marine wounded while serving in the Iraq War. He becomes engulfed in a mystery when, during a trip to visit a friend in the American Southwest, he finds that his friend has disappeared. MacPherson's amateur investigation leads him toward a wide-ranging conspiracy after he discovers that all traces of his friend's existence have been wiped out.
Entertainment Weekly points out that Marcus is not the first collaborator to slam Kilmer, though most previous complaints were made while he was still alive. Joel Schumacher – who died at 80 in 2020 – directed Kilmer when he took over the Caped Crusader's suit for 1995's Batman Forever, and he went on to call the late actor 'childish and impossible' and a 'psychologically disturbed human being' while speaking with the publication a year after its release.
John Frankenheimer, who directed classics including The Manchurian Candidate and Seven Days In May, also was left with a bad taste after working with Kilmer on The Island Of Dr. Moreau (1996). Frankenheimer reportedly vowed never to work with Kilmer again. Ironically, Kilmer co-starred in that remake with Marlon Brando, who had built up a reputation over decades of being difficult to work with.
Kilmer's Responses to Criticism
Kilmer responded to both Frankenheimer – who died at 72 in 2002 – and Schumacher in a 2003 interview with Rolling Stone. '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,' Kilmer told the publication. 'Frankenheimer, bless him, he passed on, but he had a history of being mean about people.'
Kilmer dismissed his Batman Forever director's talents as he continued. 'Schumacher’s not a great director by any stretch, but he makes everyone happy, he makes money,' Kilmer said. '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.'
'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,' he said. 'I didn’t really set out to do that, but I’m very proud that I’ve consistently made money.'
In the 2021 documentary Val, made toward the end of his life, Kilmer took a somewhat more conciliatory tone. 'I have behaved poorly. I have behaved bravely. I have behaved bizarrely to some,' he said. '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.'
The Daily Mail has reached out to Marcus's representatives for comment.
