Vulture posted an in-depth interview with Ivan Reitman, the director of the original 1984 Ghostbusters and the producer of Paul Feig’s reboot. Not only does he reveal plans for the now defunct third Ghostbusters, but he also reveals that the studio had green-lit it before Harold Ramis got sick.
“By the way, the studio green-lit it. Everything was ready to go. I couldn’t get [Bill Murray‘s] attention, and in the midst of that, Harold got really sick. And that was pretty much it.”
Dan Aykroyd had been the most public about the sequel, almost campaigning to get it into production. There were many false starts, but plenty of rumors. It’s sad to hear that Ghostbusters 3 was finally going to happen and everyone’s hard work came to a close because we lost Ramis. We can only hope that Feig’s interpretation has him smiling from above.
If Murray hadn’t been dragging his feet, it may have actually come into fruition. What Reitman is referring in the above quote to is all the of the publicly reported drama Murray brought to the development process, which is why his character was to die in the opening scene. He speaks to all of this and his theory as to why Murray kept playing games:
“I worked with Gene Stupnitsky and Lee Eisenberg, who wrote a number of movies [‘Year One’, ‘Bad Teacher’] and worked on ‘The Office’ together. They wrote a very funny script [for ‘Ghostbusters 3’] that I was very comfortable in directing, and both Harold and Danny wanted to do. And literally Bill refused to read it for a year. Then finally he may have read a few pages, and I got him on the telephone, and he said, “Look, I just don’t want to do this.” It had nothing to do with how good or bad the script was or anything like that. He was having his own issues in his own life, and I think he just didn’t want to engage…I think the reason that Bill wouldn’t read it was he didn’t want to make a decision about this. So he just ignored it.
“Bill and Sigourney’s kid, Oscar, is a postgrad student, and weird things start to happen,” he added, referring to Murray’s character in the third film. “Bill Murray dies in the first scene, because he always said, ‘I won’t do it unless I die.’ And I said, ‘Okay, you got it.’ [Laughs.] It was a father-son story, with him as a ghost.”
There was also version entitled Hellbent, in which the Ghostbusters actually battled the Devil. Reitman explains why:
“I was never a big fan of that one,” he tells the site. “Danny always loved it. To me, what was funny about the Ghostbusters was putting these extraordinary situations in a world that we knew, surrounded by people that we recognized, real New Yorkers acting like New Yorkers. I thought the comedy was in that juxtaposition. I’ve never liked the more fantastical versions.”
He segues into discussing the original plan for the 1984 film, which was to star John Belushi and take the ‘busters to space!
“Danny’s original treatment [for the original ‘Ghostbusters’], which he wrote for Belushi and himself, took place in outer space and the future, with competing groups of Ghostbusters and all kinds of stuff going on that was almost impossible to shoot on any budget, particularly then without CGI. So after Belushi passed away, he came to me. By then I had worked with Bill, I think three times, and Dan said, “I was thinking of doing this with Bill. What do you think?” And I sat down with him and pitched this contemporary story about guys who are paranormal researchers at Columbia University, get kicked out, and go into business. And it gave us a real structure to write a story that I thought could be way funnier than something more fantastical. It’s why I like the second ‘Ghostbusters’ so much. It probably wasn’t as big as it should’ve been. But I liked that a baby was at the center of it, and that it was really a domestic story. I just looked at that film again, and I was so proud of the comedy work between Sigourney Weaver, Bill, and everybody.”
The full interview has so much more, including plans for a follow up and a new animated movie!