Somewhere, Ray Parker Jr. is smiling.
Bill Murray told reporters that he's open to reprising his Ghostbusters role of Dr. Peter Venkman in a proposed third movie.
"The third one could happen," Murray said in a news conference in New York on Oct. 3.
Murray--who voiced Venkman in the upcoming Ghostbusters: The Video Game
-added that he's aware that Columbia Pictures just last month tapped Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky (NBC's The Office) to write a second sequel.
"There's two fellows from The Office that are writing a script, but I've yet to see it," Murray said while promoting his upcoming family fantasy movie, City of Ember. "And I'm more involved with, you know, trying to get the dessert we ordered at lunch than I am with the new Ghostbusters sequel. But it's possible. It's a great idea that they hired these two guys to do it, because I think it'll be a ... it could be a fresh look at it. And it could be funny."
The original Ghostbusters was released in 1984 and is widely considered a comedy classic. The first sequel, Ghostbusters II, opened in 1989 and wasn't nearly as successful financially or critically. Murray recalled his disappointment with Ghostbusters II.
"We did a sequel, and it was sort of rather unsatisfying for me, because the first one to me was the goods," Murray said. "It was the real thing. And the sequel, you know, was ... it was a few years later. There was an idea pitched. And it was like, well, they got us all together in a room. We just laughed for a couple of hours. And then they said, 'What if we did another one? Here's an idea."
Murray added, "So they had this idea, but it didn't turn out to be the idea when I arrived on the set. They'd written a whole different movie than the one [initially discussed]. And the special-effects guys got it and got their hands on it. And it was just not the same movie. There were a few great scenes in it, but it wasn't the same movie. So there's never been an interest in a third Ghostbusters because the second one was kind of disappointing ... for me, anyway." (NBC is owned by NBC Universal, which also owns SCIFI.COM.)
-Ian Spelling
