Paul Feig Blames Donald Trump for the Failure of the All-Female ‘Ghostbusters’

The 2016 version of Ghostbusters remains a weird anomaly in 21st-century comedy. Despite its meh reputation, the movie is Certified Fresh by Rotten Tomatoes. “A Ghostbuster team worth calling,” wrote critic Leonard Maltin. “This one’s a comedic win.” But no one told moviegoers, who pummeled the film with a fury that made little sense then or now. 

Leslie Jones revealed that her participation in the movie even earned her death threats. “I can’t believe anyone would do this shit to someone, anyone, for working,” she wrote in her memoir. “This is awful. I am in a movie. Death threats for something as small as that?”

Ghostbusters director Paul Feig believes he knows who was responsible for all the vitriol. “The political climate of the time was really weird, with Hillary Clinton running for office in 2016,” he told The Guardian. “There were a lot of dudes looking for a fight. When I was getting piled on, on Twitter, I’d go back and see who they were. So many were Trump supporters.”

It’s one thing to make Trump an imaginary villain to blame when things go wrong. But the candidate for President of the United States actually did make time to rant against the comedy’s casting. 

“Trump came out against us,” Feig said. “He was like, ‘They’re remaking Indiana Jones without Harrison Ford. You can’t do that. And now they’re making Ghostbusters with only women. What’s going on?’ and got all upset.” 

“Everybody went fucking cannibal,” Feig continued. “It turned the movie into a political statement, as if to say, ‘If you’re pro-women, you’re going to go see this. If you’re not, then…’ I didn’t think it mattered at all that the main characters were women, but people brought a lot of baggage.”

Feig also believed going back to the past wasn’t an option when it came to casting a new Ghostbusters movie. “Bill (Murray) had publicly said he didn’t want to do another Ghostbusters at that point,” Feig explained. “Harold Ramis had died. Dan (Aykroyd) and Ernie (Hudson) were there, but half the team felt weird. It had been 30 years and Bill and the gang were so iconic; I didn’t want to do anything that hurt the original movies.”

Besides, said the Bridesmaids director, women are hilarious. And so, he tried to do his part to give them more opportunities to be hilarious on the big screen. Or as he put it to The Guardian, “When I got to Hollywood, I started hanging out with these funny women that I knew from when I was a stand-up comedian. When I went to see their movies, they just played the mean girlfriend. I thought, I don’t like this balance.”