The Ghostbusters franchise is back in action with the movie Ghostbusters: Afterlife, premiering in theaters on November 19. The new film sees a return to the world of the original series, telling the story of Ghostbuster Egon Spengler’s (Harold Ramis) grandchildren, played by Finn Wolfhard and McKenna Grace. The kids move to a new town with their mother, played by Carrie Coon, and meet a professor played by Paul Rudd who helps them uncover their grandfather’s legacy.
Screen Rant spoke to Rudd and Coon about taking on the Ghostbusters legacy, passing the torch, and missing Harold Ramis.
Screen Rant: How do you begin to describe being on this set? You step on and see the proton packs; you see the Reitmans and the Ecto-1? How do you describe that?
Paul Rudd: It’s easy to geek out. I never quite got used to it. It was always exciting. Every day, there’d be something else. It’s like, “Wow, okay, today we’re working with proton packs. And today I get to actually hold a Ghost Trap or I see the Ecto-1.” There are certain props and things in the film, where I immediately step out of the actor role and fall into the fan role of just thinking it’s pretty cool seeing it in real life.
And then there’s the other side of that, where I’m looking at it, and then I turn my head and I’m looking over and seeing Jason Reitman behind the monitor sitting next to Ivan Reitman. Then Dan Ackroyd’s walking around, and there’s this thing that makes it, in a way, too overwhelming to think about. Because there’s a job at hand, and we have to do it. We don’t want to just become a bundle of nerves all day.
And thankfully, I think we’re able to do it. You kind of have to. There have been several times where – and I think this is probably true for Carrie as well – we’re acting with people that we just admire so much and are fans of. You do it, and when you’re doing in the scene, you’re just acting opposite who you’re acting opposite in the scene. And then, later on, you kind of think, “Oh, my God! I can’t believe I just got to shoot baskets with Michael Jordan.” That kind of feeling.
That’s kind of true to your character, Paul. But Carrie’s was a little more like, “Yeah, I don’t really care about that.” What were you like on set?
Carrie Coon: Like Paul said, if you think about it too much, you’ll get overwhelmed and you won’t come to work because you’re intimidated. What’s lovely is that Jason is a very collaborative filmmaker, and he cast the film really beautifully. There was a really lovely dynamic on set, and it didn’t feel like handing over a legacy to another generation. It felt like seemed work, and it felt like family, and it felt like specific relationship dynamics between each character. It was actually just really fun to do and really fun to work on. It didn’t feel overwhelming to do those things.
For me, it just still feels surreal that that’s what I was a part of. And now I have these pictures. My son was 16 months when I was on the set, so just like Jason grew up on the set of Ghostbusters, my son was on the set of the new Ghostbusters. I have this amazing legacy, where I’m going to have pictures of him with the Terror Dog and sitting on the Ecto-1 and hanging out with the kids. It just feels like a really palpable passing of a torch.
Harold Ramis’ presence is felt so immensely in this film. Paul, I think you’ve done three movies with Harold Ramis, are there any stories you can share?
Paul Rudd: I did know Harold, and I was such a huge fan growing up. Obviously, from the films that he’s written and being an SCTV fan when I met him for the first time I was pretty nervous. He worked with Judd – we both worked together on Apatow’s film Knocked Up, and he played Seth’s dad. We didn’t have scenes together, but he was around and I met him. I got to know him a little bit.
I worked for a day or two on the movie Year One that he directed, and we had done readings together. I got to spend a little time with him and went out to dinner with him. He was the loveliest man. Really funny, really calm, and Buddhist-like. If you look at Groundhog Day, that’s Buddhism. He was a really thoughtful person, considerate, funny. And he was very forthcoming in talking about what it was like starting out, talking about Bill Murray and Belushi and working on Second City. I really liked him.
And working on this made me really miss him and wish that I could talk to him again because I was just taken with him. Like I think most people were who got to know him.
Key Release Dates
Ghostbusters: Afterlife
Release Date:2021-11-19
