Adam Marcus directed Val Kilmer, who died in 2025, in the 2008 action thriller.

Val Kilmer’s Conspiracy director calls actor the ‘worst human being I’ve ever known’

Adam Marcus directed Val Kilmer, who died in 2025, in the 2008 action thriller.

By Sharareh Drury

June 1, 2026 3:34 p.m. ET

Val Kilmer in 'Conspiracy'. Credit:

- *Conspiracy *director Adam Marcus slammed Val Kilmer, who died in 2025, as the "worst human being I’ve ever known" in a social media post.

- Kilmer starred alongside Jennifer Esposito in the 2008 action thriller.

- *Batman Forever *director Joel Schumacher and *The Island of Dr. Moreau *director John Frankenheimer previously criticized the actor for being difficult to work with.**

Val Kilmer's legacy is getting a hit from a director who worked with the late actor on the 2008 film *Conspiracy*.

Adam Marcus, who helmed the 2008 action thriller that starred both Kilmer and Jennifer Esposito, called out the actor in a Threads post on Sunday evening.

"#MicroIntellectMonday to that time when I directed that guy. 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 wrote in the post that included a photo of the director and actor*. ***

Marcus quickly addressed anyone who'd take issue with the director speaking negatively of Kilmer, who died from pneumonia on April 1, 2025.

"And to any of you rolling your eyes because of the whole 'don’t speak ill of the dead bullsh--', f--- that," Marcus continued, saying if Kilmer "did one-tenth of what he did on my set today, he would have been cancelled in a blink."

He concluded, "Worst human being I’ve ever known… and that is really saying something."

In *Conspiracy,* Kilmer plays William "Spooky" MacPherson, a disabled Iraq War veteran who goes to visit an old friend in an Arizona border town. MacPherson discovers his friend and his family are missing, and no one will acknowledge that they ever lived there. What follows is MacPherson uncovering a corrupt corporate conspiracy targeting undocumented immigrants.

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Marcus' comments about Kilmer are not the first time the *Top Gun *actor has been knocked for being difficult to work with on set.

Joel Schumacher, who directed Kilmer in 1995's *Batman Forever*, called Kilmer "childish and impossible" and a "psychologically disturbed human being" in a 1996 interview with **. John Frankenheimer, who directed the actor in *The Island of Dr. Moreau*, said he would never work with Kilmer again after that project.**

Val Kilmer in 2019.

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Kilmer addressed those criticisms with *Rolling Stone** *in a 2003 interview, saying "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. Frankenheimer, bless him, he passed on, but he had a history of being mean about people."

As for Schumacher's disapproval of him, Kilmer said, "Schumacher’s not a great director by any stretch, but he makes everyone happy, he makes money. 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."

Kilmer continued, "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. I didn’t really set out to do that, but I’m very proud that I’ve consis­tently made money."

Years later in the 2021 documentary *Val*, which documents Kilmer's prolific career, the actor once again addressed how he's been viewed in the entertainment industry.

"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," he shared, adding, "And I am blessed."

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