Alongside Bill Murray, Harold Ramis, and Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson starred as a ghostbuster in the classic ‘80s movie of the same name. However, in the years since the ghost movie was released, questions have been raised about the treatment of Hudson’s character Winston Zeddemore, who despite being a fellow ghostbuster, wasn’t featured in the comedy movie‘s posters.
“The studio wasn’t [inclusive], and the studio continued not to be,” Hudson said during a recent interview on SiriusXM’s The Howard Stern Wrap Up Show (via IndieWire). “So it made it very, very difficult because I was a part of it but then I very selectively was pushed aside… The original script, Winston was in the very beginning of the movie. By the time we got ready to shoot the movie, Winston came in halfway through the movie. All those things… It definitely felt deliberate.”
He continued, “When the posters came out, I’m not on the poster. It took a long time. I went to the 30th anniversary release of the movie and all the posters are three guys. Now I know the fans see it differently, and I’m so thankful for the fans because the fans basically identified with Winston — especially young, I don’t want to say minority kids, but a lot of kids.” The science fiction movie actor added that the original Ghostbusters remains one of the most “difficult” films he has ever done “from the psychological perspective.”
“I’m still not trying to take it personally,” he said. “Anything bad, if you’re African American in this country, anything bad happens to you, you can always blame it on [being] Black. You don’t want to go there. That’s the last thing I want to do. I got nothing bad to say about anybody but it was hard. It took me 10 years to get past that and enjoy the movie and just embrace the movie. Ghostbusters was really hard to make peace with.”
Hudson later reprised his role in 2021’s Ghostbusters: Afterlife, and is set to return once again for 2023 movie Ghostbusters: Afterlife 2. The Ghostbusters 4 release date is currently set for December 2023, but in the meantime, here are other new movies you can look forward to this year.