Writer, actor and director Harold Ramis had a hand in seemingly half the movies we held dear in childhood, and he shows no signs of slowing his consistently relevant resume. He wrote eternal gems like 'Animal House' and 'Caddyshack,' though Ramis might be most famous for the role of brainy scientist Dr. Egon Spengler in the 'Ghostbusters' films (which he co-wrote with fellow Ghostbuster Dan Aykroyd). Ramis' latest is the upcoming prehistoric buddy film 'Year One,' starring Jack Black and Michael Cera.
We talked to the Hollywood veteran about the possibility of a rumored third film in the 'Ghostbusters' franchise, what makes an enduring comedy, and our lingering questions about 'Groundhog Day.'
You're the recipient of the annual Screenwriting Tribute at this year's Nantucket Film Festival. Is this mostly a 'Ghostbusters' anniversary event for you?
"I've been doing films - I started writing 'Animal House' in '76 - that's how long I've been working on movies. It's the 25th anniversary of the first 'Ghostbusters,' but there have been anniversaries now every year or so. Special Editions DVDs and all that stuff."
Harold Ramis, the writer and director of the ancient history buddy film 'Year One,' also appears in the film.
Sony
Harold Ramis played Seth Rogan's dad in the Judd Apatow film 'Knocked Up.'
Everett Collection
One of the most iconic films of the '70s was 'Animal House,' co-written by a young Harold Ramis.
Everett Collection
Harold Ramis co-wrote and directed 'Groundhog Day,' the story of a weatherman who relives February 2nd on an interminable loop.
Everett Collection
One of the funniest movies in the history of the comedy film: 'Stripes,' starring (and co-written by) Harold Ramis.
Everett Collection
Harold Ramis has written and directed an impressively large body of work, but to many, he is simply Dr. Egon Spengler, the brainiest Ghostbuster.
Everett Collection
Harold Ramis gives director's notes to Billy Bob Thornton on the set of 'The Ice Harvest.'
Focus Features
Director Harold Ramis behind the camera on the set of 'The Ice Harvest.'
Focus Features
That being said, does that aspect get tiresome for you? Are you more focused on promoting upcoming movies?
"Who would complain about people still talking about work you did 25 years ago? It's a great thing, and it's really good for the work I'm doing now, that people still have fondness for those films."
The big news is the planned production of 'Ghostbusters 3.' When will we see that come to fruition?
"We're a long way from 'fruition,' but the seed has been planted. We have a story that we like, and my two co-writers from 'Year One' are working on a screenplay. There are a lot of steps between a first draft and a movie."
At this point of development, can you definitively say it's going to happen?
"There are so many variables - if the studio were simply committed to perpetuating the 'Ghostbusters' franchise, it would happen whether it was good or not. In this case, we have an insistence that it at least measure up to the other movies. So no one would be happy with a substandard iteration of 'Ghostbusters.' We're classy guys, we want it to be good. Bill Murray's very choosy - there's no way he'll do it if he doesn't like the script.
Jim Carrey, Benicio Del Toro and Sean Penn are almost locked in to play 'The Three Stooges' in a movie hopefully coming out in 2010. Penn will be Larry, Carrey will be Curly and Del Toro will rock Moe.
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Mickey Rourke has negotiated more green to play a Russian villain in 'Iron Man 2.' According to Variety, Marvel wanted to give the actor $250,000. He'll play a hybrid of 2 characters: Whiplash and Crimson Dynamo.
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Michel Gondry to direct 'Green Hornet' The hyper-eccentric 'Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind' director will man the lens of Seth Rogen's superhero movie.
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Arnold Schwarzenegger is doing Sylvester Stallone a solid by agreeing to shoot a rare cameo for his upcoming flick 'The Expendables,' about a group of mercenaries trying to take down a South American dictator. Arnie will play himself: California governor. Other stars of the film include Dolph Lundgren, Eric Roberts and Mickey Rourke.
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Dakota Fanning will star in 'Twilight' sequel, 'New Moon' The nearly-15-year-old actress has been offered the part of Jane in the film.
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The Sun is reporting that Eddie Murphy has signed on to play the role in the next 'Batman' movie, slated for 2010. He'd be reprising the role last played by Jim Carrey in 1995.
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Anne Hathaway cast in 'Alice in Wonderland' The 'Rachel Getting Married' star joins Johnny Depp in Tim Burton's sure-to-be-trippy take on the beloved book. She'll play the benevolent White Queen, while Burton has tapped his main squeeze, Helena Bonham Carter, to play the bloodlusting Red Queen.
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Steve Carell cast in 'Get Smart 2' The 'Office' funnyman has signed on to reprise his role as bumbling superagent Maxwell Smart in a sequel to the summer hit. Title suggestion: 'Get Smarterer.'
Warner Bros.
Johnny Depp cast in 'Pirates of the Caribbean 4,' 'Alice in Wonderland' & 'Lone Ranger' Depp will reprise his role as swashbuckling, rum-swilling Captain Jack in a fourth 'Pirates' flick, play the tea-party-loving Mad Hatter in Tim Burton's live-action 'Alice in Wonderland' and play the Lone Ranger's sidekick Tonto in Jerry Bruckheimer's 'Lone Ranger.'
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Rachel McAdams cast in 'Sherlock Holmes' The 'Wedding Crashers' beauty will play Irene Adler, enigmatic love interest to the eponymous detective (Robert Downey Jr.) in Guy Ritchie's action-oriented take on the legendary sleuth. Jude Law co-stars as Watson.
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"They could always just say, 'We're going ahead anyway, we'll get three new Ghostbusters and that will be it.' And the whole concept of the new one is to introduce some younger Ghostbusters with us as mentors.
"It makes sense. It should work, let me put it that way."
Both Dan Aykroyd and Bill Murray have talked about the importance of having women more centrally involved in the third movie. Is that something important to you, as well? Are there specific women you'd be interested in casting?
"There are obviously some good, young comic actresses out there. I don't want to give away anything.
"My wife is a feminist, and when I was doing the movie 'Bedazzled,' and I was thinking about who could play the devil, my wife said, 'Well, why couldn't the devil be a woman?' And of course this made total sense, it was a wonderful idea, and we ended up with Elizabeth Hurley as the devil in that film.
"In fact, when we did the first 'Ghostbusters' film, we were interested in Sandra Bernhardt. She was very funny and coming into her own at the time. We talked about her for Janine, the part that Annie Potts eventually played. Sandra said, 'I'll be in it if I can be one of the Ghostbusters.' We said, 'Yeah, that's not going to happen.'
The first 'Ghostbusters' has a great, old-school look. Does the evolution of special effects inform the way you write a movie? Is there an impulse to write a bigger, splashier movie because you can?
"Well, you always could. When I think of effects, I think back to the Alexander Korda film 'The Thief of Bagdad,' which was the first big effects film I ever saw, done in the '40s. It was brilliant. The effects were just as cheesy as the effects could be - optical effects, things painted on glass, bad puppetry. It didn't matter, the movie was so entertaining. When you have a great story, it doesn't matter. If you don't have a great story and great characters, then no effects in the world are going to save you.
"I've seen so many trailers now - and they come one after another in this particular season, 'Terminator' and 'Transformers' and 'GI Joe' - you know, everything blowing up and it all looks like the same movie, and the effects couldn't be better. State-of-the-art in visual effects is tremendous, but it doesn't do you any good if no one's interested in the story you're telling.
"The first movie, the effects were kind of charming and old-fashioned, and the second 'Ghostbusters' film, the effects were state-of-the-art digital effects, and it didn't make the movie better because the effects were slicker."
'Caddyshack,' 'Animal House,' and 'Groundhog Day' were generation-defining films. What are the iconic movies of this generation?
I have sons who are 19 and 14, so I can actually track these things. 'Napoleon Dynamite' was a big movie for them, for a lot of young people. 'Superbad' was a big defining movie and a lot of adolescents will live their lives now remembering 'Superbad.' All the Judd Apatow work, 'Harold and Kumar'... you know, all these really raunchy comedies. And probably those filmmakers would say the same thing you did - they remember our stuff from their childhoods. Will Ferrell to some extent, Ben Stiller films - these are the lines my sons repeat with their friends now.
Is the raunchy film - like 'Animal House' and 'Meatballs' - indefinitely appealing, or do you sense a shift in what makes a good movie in 2009?
"You always have two things operating in culture. One is the Zeitgeist - the circumstances and conditions that are peculiar to our time. The other is the eternal truths about human experience. There's something in every person's development, from childhood to adolescence to adult, that everyone experiences, and probably has been experiencing since ancient times. That's part of the premise of 'Year One.' A certain kind of comedy will always be appropriate to adolescents - these are the coming-of-age stories about tasting the forbidden fruit, breaking the rules, challenging authority, coming from a place of innocence to a place of responsibility. These are the stories of young people."
Is there a filmmaker you're particularly excited about?
"I like all the comedy stuff, but maybe because it's all sort of in my wheelhouse, which is an expression I've never used before."
We're honored to witness your first time.
"I sort of take it for granted, unlike the work of the Coen brothers, which I do not take for granted, because everything they do feels so unique and edgy to me. The way the Woody Allens films felt when he was at the height of his power."
We have to know - how long did Bill Murray's character repeat his 'Groundhog Day?'
"I'll tell you this, when Danny Rubin wrote the original script, he envisioned it as ten thousand years. Which is kind of a throwaway number in Buddhist philosophy. When I got married, we had a Buddhist monk make a little speech before the actual ceremony. He said that my wife and I coming together represented ten thousand years of separate destiny, of karma. Ten thousand is a good number. So Danny had [Murray's character] Phil repeating the day a very long time.
"Someone made a calculation on the movie that actually got made, and it was more like ten years."
The leap of faith required to accept the premise of the movie makes this question ridiculous, but wouldn't Phil have gone completely insane after ten years? Or more insane, anyway?
"We had scenes of him going a little more insane. But there are a lot of what-ifs in any film - I'm still rewriting films I wrote 25 years ago."
Do you ever have the urge to actually redo one of your films?
"I would love to re-edit 'Club Paradise,' and I'd probably do a little re-shooting too.
Is that a possibility?
"Never. But it's a movie I thought had so much potential, so many good things, I see the mistakes I made so clearly now and I wish I could take it back."
