With Empire Magazine’s November issue feature on Ghostbusters: Afterlife, more importantly, the interview conducted with director Jason Reitman and producer Ivan Reitman, some additional details about the film have come to light.
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| Harold Ramis tribute as seen in Ghostbusters (2016). |
In a bit of news that shouldn’t surprise anyone, the article confirmed that Afterlife would feature an on-screen dedication to the late Harold Ramis, who not only portrayed Dr. Egon Spengler in the first two Ghostbusters films but was a co-writer.
Empire directly asked Jason, “Afterlife ends with a dedication to Harold Ramis. Why was that important to you?” with Reitman answering:
This movie is for my father, for my daughter and for Harold. For me, that’s it. For a long time, I had the idea of a girl finding a proton pack in a barn, walking outside and firing it into a row of corn and popcorn flew out. And I just didn’t know what to do with it. When Harold passed all of a sudden (in 2014), I knew who she was: it was Egon’s granddaughter. The concept of this intergenerational conversation between her and her grandfather become the real roots of what this story was. It became a Spengler story.
Producer of Ghostbusters: Afterlife and director of the first two films, Ivan Reitman, also shared his memories of Harold, saying:
I always thought of him as my smarter brother. He was just very reasonable, very clever. And he had a way of writing dialogue quickly and with such dexterity, I was just so impressed with him. When he wasn’t around to help me on a film, I really felt handicapped. I got to work with him on the first four or five movies that I ended up directing, and we became good, good friends. I think we spoke directly to each other in a very lovely way.
Since Ramis’ passing in 2014, several pieces of Ghostbusters media have included dedications to the actor. Some include Paul Feig’s 2016 reboot that showcased a “For Harold” graphic at the film’s end, as well, the 2019 remaster of Ghostbusters: The Video Game that added the text “In loving memory of Harold Ramis” to the game’s intro sequence.
Harold Ramis tribute as seen in Ghostbusters: The Video Game Remastered (2019).
The November issue of Empire Magazine is on newsstands now.
Ghostbusters: Afterlife arrives exclusively in theatres on November 19th, 2021.
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