What’s Going on with the Ghostbusters Franchise?
A few days ago Ghostbusters reboot writer Drew Pearce stirred the pot by addressing those pesky rumors of an “all-male” version being in the works (more about that here), which was in line with what Ivan Reitman said back in March about expanding the Ghostbusters universe to include different films, possible TV shows, and merchandise.
At the time, Ivan even went as far as saying: “Paul Feig’s film will be the first version of that, shooting in June to come out in July 2016. He’s got four of the funniest women in the world, and there will be other surprises to come. The second film has a wonderful idea that builds on that. Drew [Pearce] will start writing, and the hope is to be ready for the Russo Brothers’ next window next summer to shoot, with the movie coming out the following year. It’s just the beginning of what I hope will be a lot of wonderful movies.”
It looked like everyone was on the same page until Reitman reached out to Birth.Movies.Death. yesterday and gave the following quote: “There has been a lot of excitement recently about what is happening with the Ghostbusters franchise. As the producer of the new Ghostbusters film, I feel the need to clarify. There is only one new Ghostbusters movie and that is the Paul Feig directed version coming next July, presently filming and going fantastically. The rest is just noise.”
Interesting. Given Ivan’s quote in March, it appears he is now contradicting himself and Drew. Not sure what is going on behind the scenes. Perhaps Paul Feig and Ivan Reitman aren’t on the same page, or perhaps Drew Pearce spoke out of turn. Only time will tell, but the coming months will be interesting for the franchise. It appears we are once again left wondering… will we or won’t we get an all-male ensemble?
In the upcoming film, Melissa McCarthy is Abby Yates, Kristen Wiig is Erin Gilbert, Leslie Jones is Patty Tolan, and Kate McKinnon is Jillian Holtzmann.
Wiig and McCarthy play a pair of unheralded authors who write a book positing that ghosts are real. Flash-forward a few years and Wiig lands a prestigious teaching position at Columbia U. Which is pretty sweet, until her book resurfaces and she is laughed out of academia.
Wiig reunites with McCarthy and the other two proton pack-packing phantom wranglers, and she gets some sweet revenge when ghosts invade Manhattan and she and her team have to save the world.
The Ghostbusters reboot will haunt the big screen on July 22, 2016.
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