Dan Aykroyd Praises ‘Saturday Night’ as a ‘Pretty Accurate’ Best Picture Contender

The comedian was one of the original cast members when “Saturday Night Live” premiered on NBC in 1975

Dan Aykroyd on SNL
Dan Aykroyd on a sketch for "Saturday Night Live" in 1976. (CREDIT: Baskin/Warner Bros./Archive Photos/Getty Images)

Dan Aykroyd praised Jason Reitman’s film about the launch of “Saturday Night Live,” calling it “pretty accurate” and a “surefire candidate for Best Picture.”

The comedian was one of the original cast members of the NBC sketch show and he’s played by Dylan O’Brien in “Saturday Night.”

“Cracking a head to applaud Jason Reitman’s triumphant ‘SNL’ film. Wow! What a propulsive, engaging, funny, beautifully cast and acted, suspenseful, adventurous, music-filled ride,” Aykroyd tweeted on Friday.

He gushed that the film, which unfolds as the “SNL” cast prepared to go live for the first time in 1975, is a “perfect window into the creative process at its highest level.”

“Pretty accurate too,” Aykroyd added. “I was there that night and got to relive it wonderfully again … Don’t miss it whether you know the show or not. It is a stand-alone masterpiece and surefire candidate for Best Picture.”

The comedian and the Reitmans, of course, go way back: Aykroyd starred in the two original “Ghostbusters” films, directed by the late Ivan Reitman, and appeared in the 2021 sequel “Ghostbusters: Afterlife,” which was directed by Jason Reitman (Gil Kenan directed the most recent film in the franchise, “Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire”). Aykroyd gets a writing nod on all the films, having co-written the first with Harold Ramis and Rick Moranis.

“Saturday Night” is now playing in theaters.

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