When there’s something orchestral in your neighborhood, who you gonna call? “Ghostbusters!”
The Stay Puft Marshmallow Man stomps into Wolf Trap this Friday for a special screening of the 1984 spooky-comedy flick to celebrate its 40th anniversary with live accompaniment by the National Symphony Orchestra.
“For one thing, you get the greatest sound system in the world with the National Symphony Orchestra playing these scores,” Guest Conductor Emil de Cou told WTOP. “You have screens facing the lawn and above the orchestra bigger than any IMAX screen, it’s absolutely massive. You’re able to hear the music only the way the composer imagined it in their head and how they heard it in the studio when they recorded it.”
Directed by Ivan Reitman, the film features iconic performances by Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis and Ernie Hudson as the ghostbusting crew of Peter Venkman, Ray Stantz, Egon Spengler and Winston Zeddemore, alongside Sigourney Weaver as Dana Barrett a.k.a. Zuul and Rick Moranis as Louis Tully a.k.a. The Keymaster.
“It’s a great film, an iconic film now, but at the time it was kind of a quirky film,” de Cou said. “I think they had trouble even getting it up and running because it was first supposed to be down with John Belushi, but he passed away sadly, so they got a bunch of ‘SNL’ people, just getting the casting right and everything, but it’s kind of an unusual genre of a spooky horror science-fiction comedy, which I don’t know that anyone had ever made before.”
The NSO will perform the instrumental score by Elmer Bernstein, who delivered sweeping scores for “The Ten Commandments” (1956), “The Magnificent Seven” (1960), “To Kill a Mockingbird” (1962) and “The Great Escape” (1963) before surprisingly shifting to comedy with “Animal House” (1978), “Meatballs” (1979), “Airplane!” (1980), “The Blues Brothers” (1980), “Stripes” (1981), “Trading Places” (1983) and “Ghostbusters” (1984).
“He writes this score, which I think he said it was the most difficult score he had ever written because it has to go in between the comic stuff, the goofy stuff,” de Cou said. “You have a honky-tonk piano with a tube at the bottom that sounds kind of like Dixieland you’d hear in New Orleans or something, then you get these spooky, atonal, hazy chords that kind of inform something that’s evil like a ghost or something in the museum or library coming alive.”
In addition to Bernstein’s instrumental score, you’ll also hear Ray Parker Jr.’s iconic “Ghostbusters” song, which topped the Billboard Hot 100 chart for three weeks and stayed on the charts for a total of 21 weeks.
“At the end, of course, is the famous tune, which I think the audience will probably sing along,” de Cou said. “They added the orchestra on top of the song, so we play with it like an orchestration that you would do with a pop performer. I think originally it was just with the band, but we accompany it, so it’ll be fun. I’ve never done that.”
Feel free to dress up as your favorite characters, just don’t cross the streams!
“Everyone in the D.C. area, come to Wolf Trap,” de Cou said. “It’s the best place to hear music and have a great time. Bring a snack, bring wine, bring your friends and enjoy movies the way they’re meant to be seen and heard.”
Listen to our full conversation here.
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