How Jason and Ivan Reitman crossed their filmmaking streams to revive ‘Ghostbusters’
LOS ANGELES — As a filmmaker, Ivan Reitman built a hugely successful career on a foundation of laughs with comedies like “Meatballs,” “Stripes,” “Twins” and “Dave.” But on a recent afternoon in Beverly Hills, Reitman was fighting back tears as he sat beside his son, Jason, discussing their new film, “Ghostbusters: Afterlife.”
This particular day was already freighted with significance for the elder Reitman as he celebrated his 75th birthday. But more than that, he was feeling deeply moved to find himself, decades after directing the original 1984 smash “Ghostbusters” and its 1989 sequel, now passing the torch of his greatest success to his son. “I’m sorry I’m crying,” Reitman said. “This has been a very emotional experience.”
For the Reitmans, “Afterlife” — which hit theaters Friday after being delayed more than a year by the pandemic — marks an unlikely union of father-and-son filmmakers, a crossing of the proverbial proton streams that for years neither one imagined would ever happen. Jason, 44, who has earned four Oscar nominations for his work on the films “Juno”
