Somebody must have called, because Ghostbusters past and present showed up Saturday on the black carpet — with accents of ectoplasmic green — for the Hollywood premiere of the much talked about Ghostbusters revival, 32 years after the original premiere and 27 years after its sequel.
Tan Ghostbusters jumpsuits, some accessorized with proton packs, were the uniform of the day for many ardent fans along Hollywood Boulevard in Los Angeles, as stars gathered for a film featuring an all-female team of ghost fighters, one that has been anticipated by many fans and derided by others.
USA TODAY attended the festivities, speaking to the new cast, including stars Melissa McCarthy, Kate McKinnon and Leslie Jones, along with actors from the 1984 original and its 1989 sequel, including Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson and Annie Potts. Ivan Reitman, director of the first two films, and Ray Parker Jr., the man behind the iconic theme song, also discussed the films.
Aykroyd, who played scientist Ray Stantz in the first two movies and makes a cameo in the new Paul Feig-directed film, applauded the idea of a team of women fighting off wraiths, apparitions and vapors in New York City (Interview begins about six minutes into the video above.). The casting has been the subject of substantial Internet criticism.
"I feel immense gratitude for these megastars, these women here, who’ve signed on to do it," Aykroyd told USA TODAY. "They bring a female sensibility and a female perspective, which is different than the male, no matter how you cut it. They bring (an) ethos and ethic and a decency and an honesty that the women have. They like the truth to be told."
Aykroyd, who wrote the 1984 film with fellow Ghostbusters cast member Harold Ramis, credited his late friend for the long-lasting popularity of the original, which also featured Hudson and Bill Murray as members of the ghost-battling quartet.
"There's just concepts that are very good," he said. The new film "is good. They stay true to the essence of the first two movies and to the intelligence of Harold's writing and the intelligence of this plot structure. You can almost say they took the blueprint of the first two movies, lifted them, rebuilt the superstructure, put a new engine in the (Ectomobile) and refurbished it for today."
McCarthy, who joins McKinnon, Jones and Kristen Wiig as the new Ghostbusters, told USA TODAY she loves the jumpsuits, but had a complaint about one accessory.
"The gloves are the hottest," she said. "Our hands were on fire."
The ghost-fighting technology brought out the kid in her.
"To have things brought back from the original, the 12-year-old version of myself is completely freaking out," she said. "And then the new stuff is fascinating."
Parker, who spoke to USA TODAY about the inspiration for the theme, even sang a bit of the iconic anthem during a Facebook Live session (about 7:30 into the video below, after an interview with Potts).
"I watched the first film and it just came to me like that. All those ideas and all those idiosyncrasies just came to me. It was good day on the job," he said of his inspiration.
Fans say two things to Parker about the song. "They say either, 'Who you gonna call?,' and they laugh and say, 'I apologize ahead of time,' or they go, 'I ain't afraid of no ghosts,' " he said. "I like it."
Reitman told USA TODAY he was thrilled with the revival.
"It's almost incomprehensible," he said. "The idea that the story is continuing with these really talented people, this extraordinary cast, (is) very much in the spirit of the first movie. … There's things in this I never could have done in 1984 and its fabulous to see it."
