The Passing of a Comedy Legend that many People Didn't Know

When Saturday Night Live premiered in the Fall of 1975 I immediately knew that it was something special. Having grown up enjoying the comedy of Jack Benny, Jerry Lewis, Johnny Carson, Bob Hope, and others it was clear that SNL was something entirely different, a comedy from and about my generation. It was a seminal cultural event. I would routinely stay in on Saturday nights just to watch SNL with my friends. Nearly 40 years later, SNL is now an institution, but at the time it was part of a revolution.

This article is about someone who was never on SNL and never wrote for the show, but was as much a part of the entertainment revolution that SNL represented as Chevy Chase, Bill Murray, or John Belushi. He arguably had a bigger influence on this new wave of comedy than any of these famous performers and yet most people wouldn't recognize his name.

A Chicago native, Harold Ramis began his career as an feature entertainment writer for the Chicago Daily News. Later, he worked briefly a joke writer for Playboy magazine. His first real job in comedy was as a performer and eventually head writer for SCTV, the Chicago-based sketch show that both inspired SNL and provided many of its original cast members, including John Belushi, Gilda Radner, and Bill Murray.

Ramis's introduction to Hollywood came in 1978 as a screenwriter for Animal House, which starred SCTV cast mate and SNL member John Belushi. It was a huge hit and Ramis became a bankable figure for behind-the-scenes work in contemporary comedy. Ramis's connection to SNL continued with his next four films in which he served as either writer or director: Meatballs (Bill Murray), Caddyshack (Chevy Chase and Bill Murray), Stripes (Bill Murray), and National Lampoon's Vacation (Chevy Chase). The John Hughes-penned Vacation was a huge success and inspired many sequels starring Chase, though Ramis was only involved with the original.

His biggest hits came in the mid 1980s and early nineties with Ghostbusters I and II and Groundhog Day, which among his many films is the most likely to be remembered as a classic.. All of these efforts involved collaborations with either Bill Murray, Chevy Chase, or Dan Aykroyd. Other than a few small roles, he appeared in front of the camera only with Murray in Stripes and with Murray and Aykroyd in the Ghostbusters films. His primary contribution was behind the camera as a creative force.

Ramis's singular major success without SNL ties was in 1999 with Analyze This, which he directed. Analyze This and a less successful sequel starred Robert De Niro and Billy Crystal. Ironically, Analyze This, a story about a mob figure (De Niro) who seeks treatment from a psychiatrist (Crystal) came out the same year as The Sopranos, which had essentially the same theme.

If I had to pick one Harold Ramis film that is not well-remembered, but offers consistent laughs it would be Multiplicity, a film he directed in 1996 starring Michael Keaton and Andie McDowell (Murray's love interest in Groundhog Day). Keaton plays multiple roles as a character who clones himself as a way of giving himself--the original--more time to pursue personal interests. It is a lot of fun and Keaton and McDowell both give great performances.

Harold Ramis died yesterday at the too-young age of 69 after a four-year battle with autoimmune inflammatory vasculitis, an autoimmune disease related to lupus in which the body attacks the blood vessels, which can result in multiple organ failure.

Recently, there was some talk of a Ghostbusters III film, which Bill Murray tended to dismiss in public interviews. It certainly won't happen now.

Harold Ramis Selected Fimography

Screenwriter
SCTV (1976-1979)
Animal House (1978)
Meatballs (1979)
Stripes (1981)
Ghostbusters (1984)
Ghostbusters II (1989)

Director
National Lampoon's Vacation (1983)
Multiplicity (1996)

Writer/Director
Caddyshack (1980)
Groundhog Day (1993)
Analyze This (1999)