'Ghostbusters III': Harold Ramis offers details, says original cast will be back

Earlier this week at ShoWest, Sony Pictures’ Rory Bruer confirmed long-circulating rumors that the studio was pursuing a third installment of Ghostbusters. You won’t hear Harold Ramis contradicting him. According to Ramis, who cowrote and starred in the first two Ghostbusters, a third journey into the comedic supernatural is in the cards. And yes, the original cast will return: Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson, Rick Moranis, and even the elusive Bill Murray. “Everybody said
they’d do it,” says Ramis, who doesn’t intend to direct Ghostbusters III. “They’ll be looking at younger actors
[for the lead roles], I’m sure. But we’ll be in it as mentors or
advisers. I think the first one captured something that hadn’t been seen for a
long time: the combination of scary movies and smart broad comedy. That was a great comic edge to play. Fortunately, we stopped before we
beat it into the ground. If we’d done a third one then, no one would
want to see one now, I think, cause we were headin’ downhill, even with
the second one,” he laughs. “We’ll see, everyone’s
gonna have to love the [Ghostbusters III] script to move it forward.”

But it might be a while before anyone sees the screenplay. Gene Stupinksy and Lee Eisenberg, the exec-producers of The Office who also cowrote June’s upcoming Year One with Ramis, are toiling away on a draft, but because “they work full-time on The Office, the script process is
slow,” says Ramis. “Even if there was a great script by the end of the summer, it
would be a year before [we could go into production]. It’s a big movie. Lots of prep.” As for the plot, it won’t have anything to do with the “Ghostbusters Go to Hell” premise that Aykroyd had cooked up in the ’90s. (At the time, he and Ramis were thinking of casting Chris Farley, Chris Rock, and Ben Stiller.) “As soon as
Danny said it, I thought that was really funny. But now there’s a new
concept,” Ramis says. “And it’s interesting, beyond the kind of mythology of it,
there’s a personal story that’s pretty grounded.”