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Early Career[]

Harold was first known as a writer in National Lampoon's Animal House. Harold directed National Lampoon's Vacation in 1983, starring Chevy Chase and Beverly D'Angelo. Harold's daughter Violet Ramis had a minor role in the movie. As Randy Quaid/Eddie Johnson's daughter in the movie Daisy Mable Johnson.

Film Roles[]

Harold was best known for his work on Meatballs, Caddyshack, Year One, Ghostbusters, Groundhog Day, and Stripes etc.

Passing[]

On February 24th, 2014, Mr. Ramis passed away due to complications from a rare disease Autoimmune inflammatory vasculitis, a condition he battled for four years. Ramis died Monday morning in his Chicago-area home and is survived by his wife, Erica Mann Ramis, three children and two grandchildren.[1]

Trivia[]

References[]

  1. CNN 2/24/14
  2. Harold Ramis (1999). Ghostbusters- Commentary (1999) (DVD ts. 01:02:48-01:03:14). Columbia TriStar Home Video. Harold Ramis says: "Well, just for you acting buffs out there. I'd made a decision not to smile in this entire movie. That's about as close to a smile as I get. For you Spengler fans, he was described in the script as a New Age Mr. Spock. I tried to play him that way."
  3. Winston Zeddemore (2009). The Real Ghostbusters - "Take Two" (1986) (DVD ts. 06:20-06:24). Time Life Entertainment. Winston says: "Murray...Aykroyd...Ramis. What's that? A law firm?"
  4. Eisenberg, Adam (November 1989). Ghostbusters Revisited, Cinefex magazine #40, page 11. Cinefex, USA. Harold Ramis says: "The Scoleri brothers sequence was one of those nice discoveries. At one point we committed ourselves to having the Ghostbusters fight their way back to being Ghostbusters rather than starting out with them as successes. With this in mind, we were working toward a courtroom scene, but we did not know exactly what should happen there. Meanwhile, the ghosts themselves were very loosely based on the fact that my father was a storekeeper who was once robbed and assaulted by the Scoleri brothers. The whole point of our trial was that the legal system of New York was completely skeptical of the supernatural. At some point, the idea of the courtroom and the Scoleri brothers came together. We thought, what better way to reinstate the Ghostbusters than at the moment of their sentencing to have two ghosts appear in the courtroom? It was one of those nice discoveries that brings ideas together and says what you want to say. It also connected with the notion that negative human emotions have an impact. The judge is angry--a tyrant in his own courtroom--and he pays the price."
  5. Eisenberg, Adam (November 1989). Ghostbusters Revisited, Cinefex magazine #40, page 28-29. Cinefex, USA. Harold Ramis says: "The idea of having the baby out on the ledge was to offshoot of my having a baby walk like an adult. At one point, we were really considering doing that--but it would have involved either a stop-motion puppet or an adult in a baby suit. Neither of those approaches would have worked without it being in really dim light. As soon as Ivan thought about making a baby walk, he was not thrilled. It just seemed like too much--it made the baby too important."
  6. Eisenberg, Adam (November 1989). Ghostbusters Revisited, Cinefex magazine #40, page 42. Cinefex, USA. Ernie Hudson says: "The nice thing about Ghostbusters was that nobody held back, no matter what they were asked to do. Everybody was committed , having fun and giving one hundred percent. When we did the scene where we slide down the rope and landed in the restoration room, we had to go pretty high up in the rafters to slide down the rope. But Bill was there, Danny was there and so was Harold. That made it pretty hard not to commit. We were up there with our backpacks on, and I was thinking, 'Gee I don't know about this.' But Danny was all excited about it and Harold loved it so much that he went up and down five times."
  7. Spook Central "Ghostbusters Fan Fest - Ghostbusters: The Video Game Panel" 6:05-6:15 10/4/19 Panelist says: "So the first thing I did was fly to Chicago, uh, to talk to Harold and convince him. Then he was somewhat reluctant to do it, uh, until we talked to Dan. And then he was interested enough for us to approach Dan."
  8. Spook Central "Ghostbusters Fan Fest - Ghostbusters: The Video Game Panel" 6:29-6:37 10/4/19 Panelist says: "And then we went to The Office, uh, the set of The Office where Harold was directing an episode and we sat in the waiting room of The Office and we showed him the demo."
  9. New York Times "New Video Game? Who You Gonna Call?" 5/28/2009 Dan Aykroyd says: "They gave me the script. I took it. I rewrote it doing little tiny structural things, mostly bringing back the tone of the original dialogue and the vernacular - the terms, the idiom - but they really had it. Two-thirds of it was there. Then they gave it to Harold. He did the same thing."
  10. Playstation Blog "Inside the Development of Ghostbusters: The Video Game" 10/2/19 John Melchior says: "One time, there was a debate about the museum location. I called Harold, who was on the set of The Office directing an episode, and he called me back from his break to weigh in and provide guidance about what would best fit the world. Dan was also always there. He would regularly see the game and review the levels we were creating to see how they played into the canon of their creation."
  11. Ray Stantz (2015). IDW Comics- "Ghostbusters: Get Real Issue #3" (2015) (Comic p.14). Ray says: "It was a snap once we upgraded the Ramis Boards from a six-pin to an eight!"
  12. paulfeig Tweet 11/27/16
  13. paulfeig Tweet 10/3/16 Paul Feig says: "He's the one who high fives Rowan outside the concert & says "Ozzy rocks!" That's Harold's son Daniel."

Gallery[]

Selected Photos[]

Secondary Canon[]

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