Dan Aykroyd, a long-time comedy veteran, recently made an appearance on Denis Miller’s radio show. Miller, of course, could not resist asking Aykroyd about the future of the Ghostbusters franchise.
The original Ghostbusters film spawned only one mediocre sequel, but it became the center of a massive franchise including dozens of books, toys, video games, and even a couple television series. Of course, it may also be the most commonly quoted film in all of geek culture.
A third film has been a long time in waiting, and periodically we hear from Aykroyd, who co-stared in, and helped write and produce, the original film, with updates as to the progress of the promised production.
It seems that getting Bill Murray, who played the protagonist of the first two films, to sign on has been a sticking point so far, but now it seems that Aykroyd and the others are determined to make it work with or without him.
Announcing on air that filming will begin in the spring no matter what, when asked about including Murray, Aykroyd said “That is our hope. We have an excellent script. What we have to remember is that ‘Ghostbusters’ is bigger than any one component, although Billy was absolutely the lead and contributive to it in a massive way, as was the director and Harold [Ramis], myself and Sigourney [Weaver]. The concept is much larger than any individual role and the promise of ‘Ghostbusters 3’ is that we get to hand the equipment and the franchise down to new blood.
“My character, Ray, is now blind in one eye and can’t drive the Cadillac,” he continued, “He’s got a bad knee and can’t carry the packs… Egon is too large to get into the harness. We need young blood and that’s the promise. We’re gonna hand it to a new generation.”
He went on to reveal that the new Ghostbusters team will be composed of three men and one woman. He also stated that he’d like to see Matthew Gray Gubler (from Criminal Minds) take one of the roles, but that he has not yet been contacted.
I can only imagine the feeling a young actor might get to hear a veteran like Aykroyd declare publicly and specifically that he’d like to work with you.
