“I WANTED TO MAKE A THEATRE FULL OF PEOPLE SCREAM WITH LAUGHTER THE WAY IVAN DID”
LIKE EVERY OTHER comedy nerd, from the moment I saw Meatballs on its opening weekend, I was an Ivan Reitman fan. My friends and I in Michigan would make each other laugh endlessly by reciting lines from Stripes, and when I saw Ghostbusters on opening night as a film student at USC, I knew I wanted to make movies like he did. Being in film school, I was surrounded by very serious film majors who all wanted to be the next Jean-luc Godard. I wanted to be Ivan Reitman. To make a theatre full of people scream with laughter the way Ivan did the first time we all saw the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man or heard Bill Murray say, “He slimed me”, and, “It’s true, this man has no dick”, that to me was a higher calling than any serious arthouse film. And Ivan was a master at doing it right.
So, imagine the feeling that would occasionally grip me out of nowhere when I’d be in a meeting or at a meal or on the set with Ivan when we were making Ghostbusters: Answer The Call. To get to know your heroes is one thing. To get to work with them is another. I discovered that not only was Ivan a great comedy director, he was a great producer too, knowing when to offer up his advice and guidance and when to step back and let you fulfil your vision, even if it was different than he would have done. He wanted to let your voice be unique to your film the way his voice was unique to all of his, and he supported you fully when he saw your passion. He knew how to cut to the heart of a problem with a solution that was simple and elegant, and he felt all triumphs deeply. After our final test screening, where some reshoots we had worked on took our audience scores from good to great, Ivan came up to me in the lobby, gripped my arm and said very emotionally, “I’m so happy for you I could cry.” I’ll never forget that moment and the sincere look in his eyes for the rest of my life. That’s how much he cared about what he did and the people he worked with.
Comedy directors don’t die. They just step to the back of the theatre and let the audience continue to enjoy their work, continue to make them laugh with the decisions they made and with the people they put on the screen. They continue to affect audiences with the dialogue they oversaw and the ideas they hatched, with the emotions and messages they hid inside the funny and with the positivity they put into the world. Comedy directors just want you to have fun, and Ivan brought us more fun than we will ever be able to thank him for. But right now, I’ll try.
Thank you, Ivan, from all of us, for making this world a much funnier place. We will never forget you.