Dan Aykroyd has been trying to get Ghostbusters 3 off the ground for a long time now, but it seems he has hit a speed bump. After generating interest from the original crew, including Harold Ramis and director Ivan Reitman, the studio, and fans all around the world, but he can’t seem to get his good friend Bill Murray on board.
In an interview with the Telegraph, Aykroyd said that the film is currently in “suspended animation”. At this rate he doesn’t believe the film will ever get made.
“The studio, the director Ivan Reitman and Harold Ramis feel there must be a way to do it, but Bill Murray will not do the movie. He doesn’t want to be involved. He’s got six kids, houses all over America. He golfs in these tournaments where they pay him to turn up and have a laugh. He’s into this life and living it,” said Aykroyd.”I know we’d have a lot of fun [but] I can’t be mad at him. He’s a friend first, a colleague second. We have a deep personal relationship that transcends business and he doesn’t want to know.”
Reitman, Ramis, and Columbia would love to do it without Murray, but Aykroyd doesn’t want to do it if they can’t get the whole band back together for the project. Aykroyd goes on to say that he doesn’t want to do the movie either if it exploits the franchise, despite what the studio wants. The only way around Murray’s absence would involve recasting the Venkman character, killing him off prior to the film’s story and/or bringing him back as a CGI ghost. Considering that Aykroyd is looking to recapture the magic of the original films, it is highly unlikely that he’d go with any of these options.
This news dashes any hope that we will see a Ghostbusters 3 made with the original cast, but a much rumored reboot could still bring Ghostbusters back to the big screen.
