Well, here’s a shock… despite reports last month that Sony Pictures Entertainment had given director Ivan Reitman the green light to shoot Ghostbusters III next summer, The Hollywood Reporter has now revealed that “any decision on Ghostbusters III, the long, long-gestating sequel, has been postponed until the end of March [2013] — this after Men in Black 3 writer Etan Cohen was paid a huge sum of money for a script.”
Confirming the original plan to shoot the sequel next summer, THR now claims that filming on Ghostbusters III “couldn’t start before the fall at the earliest” due to uncertainty over the financial stability of Sony’s Japanese parent company. Although Sony’s chief executive Kaz Hirai has played down talk of financial difficulties, Sony has recently sold half of George Clooney’s next directorial effort Monuments Men to Fox and Adam Sandler has signed a deal with Paramount to produce his next film Ridiculous 6.
The third instalment of the Ghostbusters movie franchise has seemingly been in development from the moment that Ghostbusters II hit cinemas way back in 1989, although this year has brought renewed optimism that the project might finally see the light of day. However, if Ghostbusters III does become a reality, it will be without Bill Murray, with Dan Aykroyd confirming earlier this year that Murray had opting against reprising the role of Peter Venkman alongside Aykroyd’s Ray Stanz, Harold Ramis’ Egon Spengler and Ernie Hudson’s Winston Zeddemore.