Cutting Room Floor

The telephone rings prompting Janine Melnitz to abandon the task of painting her nails.

Janine Melnitz: Hello, Ghostbusters. Listen, you're gonna have to speak up! I can't hear you! Of course we're serious. Rockefeller Center? Help is on the way. 

Dr. Ray Stantz: Who was it?

Janine Melnitz: Something is chopping the SNL sets to bits at Studio 8H!

Dr. Ray Stantz: What could it be?

Cut to the Ecto-1 speeding out of the firehouse. Cut to Dr. Ray Stantz, Dr. Egon Spengler, Dr. Peter Venkman and Winston Zeddemore climbing the stairs of the GE Building. Pan from Ghostbusters standing in the entrance of Studio 8H to a wrecked Saturday Night News stage set. A silhouette of a man is cut into the map of the United States behind the news anchor desk. Venkman, Spengler and Zeddemore walk through the silhouette. Stantz turns around and is surprised to find he is not alone. 

Although Dan Akroyd wrote the character of Dr. Peter Venkman for John Belushi his plans were changed with Belushi's untimely death in 1982. Akroyd's close association with Saturday Night Live made him aware of practice footage for an unaired Belushi skit entitled "Samurai Mechanic." Director Ivan Reitman and Akroyd adapted the script and worked closely with the visual effects team in an attempt to incorporate this footage into the film but were ultimately unhappy with the results and decided to cut the scene from the film.