Yahoo Lifestyle "Bruce Always Seemed Like A Decent Guy": People Are Reacting After Haley Joel Osment Shared His Touching Voicemails From Bruce Willis After "The Sixth Sense"
Believe it or not, it's been 25 years since the release of The Sixth Sense.
I'm so sorry to age you like this.
In honor of the anniversary, Haley Joel Osment did an interview with Entertainment Weekly, where he reflected on his "memorable" experience working alongside Bruce Willis.
Of course, the 1999 horror mystery film chronicled the relationship between child psychologist Dr. Malcolm Crowe (Bruce) and his young client Cole Sear (Haley), who can see ghosts. Haley was just 11 years old when he appeared in the film — which went on to earn $673 million at the global box office.
When asked whether he'd maintained contact with Bruce in the years after the film, Haley admitted he'd heard from Bruce "a lot." "He'd leave voicemails at the house from time to time, just checking in," Haley said.
"He would just call out of the blue," he continued, "so sometimes it was in the lead-up before travel. We went to Japan together twice, if I remember correctly, to open Sixth Sense in different cities. So he would call ahead of that, and then sometimes I would just come home from school and the answering machine would be blinking and it'd be him going like, 'Hey, Haley Joel. Just saying hi.'"
Haley said he believes he "preserved" the tapes — he just needs to find them.
He also said that in recent years, he hasn't had contact with Bruce, who retired in 2022 after his aphasia diagnosis, but that he does know his daughters "a little bit."
Online, people thought the story was honestly really sweet.
Taking to Reddit, one person wrote, "This is honestly pretty sweet. Specially for a child actor, it's very cute Bruce didn't see him as a prop or a bother and instead wanted to keep an eye on him and make sure he was doing okay. Based on his relationship with his daughters, dude sounds like someone who's always been good with kids."
Another agreed that "Bruce Willis seems like such a nice guy and a good dad to his daughters," adding that they were "so happy" to hear how he continued to support Haley after the movie.
"Bruce always seemed like a decent guy," a third fan observed. "I'd like to think it's his Jersey upbringing."
Some people even got emotional.
"Why is this going to make me cry?" one person wrote. "Idk I think just seeing all the Harry Potter cast tributes to Maggie Smith and knowing how Bruce Willis is doing while reading this really sweet story...sigh."
Someone else said, "When you hear story after story of men in Hollywood using their power to victimize and harm vulnerable people around them, to hear about Bruce being such a decent person to those around him is just SO refreshing. I wish it didn't feel like such a big deal. This should be the norm. But....since this is the world we seem to live in, it's just really lovely to hear."
Someone else called the story "so precious." "Bruce Willis has always really seemed like an alright dude," they added.
You can read Haley's full EW interview here and stream The Sixth Sense now on Max.
