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The Blues Brothers Coming To TV?
Dan Aykroyd pitching a pilot to networks

31 August 2011  |  Written by James White  |  Source: Variety


The Blues Brothers Coming To TV?

While he’s still looking to get the Ghostbusters back on the big screen, it seems Dan Aykroyd also wants to continue one of his other famous co-creations – The Blues Brothers – in some fashion, though this time on the goggle box.

Variety reports that Aykroyd, along with John Belushi’s ex-wife Judy, have owned the TV rights to the characters of Jake and Elwood Blues for years, and that they’re now shopping the prospect of a Blues Brothers series around the US networks. The package so far includes a pilot script written by Aykroyd, former Saturday Night Live scribe Anne Beatts, Wayne Catania and Kieron Lafferty.

The plot will see the musically inclined pair freshly out of jail, with Elwood on the hunt for his real father. While the intention is to find new actors to play the brothers, Aykroyd will be involved as the voice of their parole officer.

After debuting on SNL in 1978, the Blues Brothers sketches became one of the earliest breakouts from the show. Elwood (Aykroyd) and Jake (John Belushi) formed a touring band and starred in 1980’s classic John Landis comedy built around them. Despite the fact that Belushi died in 1982, Aykroyd has never quite let the idea of the duo die with him. On the positive side, he spearheaded the House of Blues music venues and toured the band with Jim Belushi. On the negative side, his continuing obsession also spawned dodgy film sequel Blues Brothers 2000 in 1998 (although the silver lining there is the song How Blue Can You Get).

But because nothing can be left alone these days, it appears that if one of the US channels picks up the idea, the boys will be back. “I think these are great American characters," Judy Belushi tells Variety. "We want to keep them alive. We chose to introduce them as new characters but do it in an way that they have some history, have some life behind them." Pray the latest incarnation of their “mission from God” turns out better than the second movie…


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Your Comments

Silver Lining
Thank you for mentioning How Blue Can You Get as the 'silver lining' of BB2000. That song alone gives the film a free pass from criticism in my eyes. The whole soundtrack's pretty good, to be honest, and the music would be the major reason for a Blues Brothers series being a good thing. More

Posted by hillbillyjim at 22:51 on 31 August 2011 | Report This Post

RE: Re: Aykroyd...
Ah, Dan, what are you playing at? Surely you must have so much money you don't need to work again? So why not just disappear gracefully instead of trying to relive the 80s? Ghostbusters? Old hat, leave it as a classic (even the sequel was pretty good.) Blues Brothers is sacrosanct - a TV show version sounds like a bad joke and hopefully it'll go no further. More

Posted by BelfastBoy at 19:17 on 31 August 2011 | Report This Post

Re: Aykroyd...
.... Is the man in debt or something? More

Posted by andyswright at 12:54 on 31 August 2011 | Report This Post

He has every right to exploit his creations. I'm sure Blues Brothers 2000 is a valid reminder of how not to though. If anyone can, he can, but the purists will never be happy even if it were better than the original. Though that scarcely happens. More

Posted by sweetladybrick at 10:49 on 31 August 2011 | Report This Post

Terrible, terrible idea.
I hope the networks laugh him out of the office. More

Posted by stuxmusic at 10:40 on 31 August 2011 | Report This Post


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