Quotes

If it hadn't been for Carleton [University], The Blues Brothers (1980) would never have been made.

'Ghostbusters 3' will never happen. Unless Bill Murray agrees. Everyone else would love to do it--Columbia, [Harold Ramis], myself, [Ivan Reitman]. It's a five-way rights situation and Bill is locking up his piece of the rights because he feels that was work he just wants preserved and he doesn't want it diluted. As an artist I can respect that.

[on Blues Brothers 2000 (1998)] Basically they gave us the budget to make the film. We got paid zero. I wanted Jim Belushi to play the part Joe Morton did, but he was doing a TV show and couldn't do it. But Morton did a great job and John Goodman did a good job. I think it's a good companion piece to the first film.

Chevy Chase was the first to make it huge - people would recognize him in the street: 'Hey Chubby Chase, look at Chubby Chase'. Everybody knew who he was. He was the first to start on a movie career and maybe [John Belushi] was a little jealous. But I liked Chevy and was sorry to see him leave Saturday Night Live (1975)]. He's one of the master physical comedians. I think you can place Buster Keaton and Chevy in the same sentence and be pretty safe there.

[when asked if he ever gets recognized for anything] I have this young female demographic that recognizes me as the dad from My Girl (1991) and this older female demographic that recognizes me as the son from Driving Miss Daisy (1989).

[eulogizing his good friend and fellow Blues Brother, the late great John Belushi] "...A good man, but a bad boy."

The entertainment business is not the be-all and end-all for me.

I have this kind of mild nice-guy exterior, but inside my heart is like a steel trap. I'm really quite robotic.

I get off on fantasy. I love fiction of all kinds. I've always been a big fan of science fiction and of the worlds of the spiritual and the mystic. I think those areas are a never-ending source for story ideas.

My attitude has always been, "Hey, wouldn't it be funny if -." If this makes me laugh, maybe somebody else will laugh at it, too. That's really where I've always come from. My whole thing is to entertain, make people laugh and to forget about the real world for awhile. It's not always easy doing that. I'm never completely happy with anything I've done. If I've been successful with 80 percent of everything I've done, then I'm doing all right by the audience and myself.

[on Ghostbusters (1984)] I knew we were making something people would come to see, like they came to National Lampoon's Animal House (1978) and Stripes (1981). I knew it would open. But I didn't know it would stay at the US box-office number-one slot for 13 weeks. It was like we'd hit a gusher in the oil business.

[on Ghostbusters II (1989)] There are some tremendous sequences. The river of slime, Vigo, the whole baby thing, the possessed Ghostbusters...I'd say it holds up to the first movie about 75 per cent. If there's a deficiency, it's the ending - it's hard to follow up Mr Stay Puft. But I consider it a great companion to the first movie. And it was a hit.