Ernie Hudson, who starred in the original Ghostbusters film, refused to attribute his reduced role to racism in a recent interview.
When a reporter implied racism may have played a factor, Hudson pushed back, noting many factors influence success and it’s “not quite that simple.”
He said attributing everything to racism “takes all my power away.”
“… it’s very tempting, sometimes, to blame anything that doesn’t work in your life on racism. But there are a lot of things that play into it. It’s not quite that simple.” – Ghostbusters actor Ernie Hudson
Wise man. pic.twitter.com/puW8iQJQDe
— Marina Medvin 🇺🇸 (@MarinaMedvin) March 27, 2024
“It’s very tempting, sometimes, to blame anything that doesn’t work in your life on racism. But there are a lot of things that play into it. It’s not quite that simple,” Hudson said.
Hudson added, “We can say it’s a racial thing, but I think if Eddie Murphy had played the role I played, he would have been paid very well.”
Hudson had a smaller role because he was less established than costars Bill Murray and Dan Aykroyd at the time.
Older minority actors like Hudson, Freeman and Williams often faced racism but resisted seeing it as the sole explanation, instead striving for success on merit.
“I think they said for the story, you know, we got three guys who are really established in the industry, and I was really just getting started,” Hudson said.
While acknowledging racism exists, they took a balanced, common sense view that other business factors also influence outcomes rather than seeing racism as the dominant force behind every setback.
“If I go to the racial side of it and blame that, it takes all my power away, because if I blame racism there’s nothing I can learn from it,” he said in 2014.
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