Ghostbusters super fans get engaged at famous NYC firehouse — as stars show up to promote new movie
Who you gonna call? A justice of the peace!
Adam Dittebrand got down on one knee in front of the famous “Ghostbusters Firehouse” in lower Manhattan on Thursday and proposed to his cosplaying girlfriend Samantha Cartwright as dozens of the film’s super fans looked on.
Dittebrand and Cartwright drove six hours from Cleveland to FDNY Ladder 8 — the firehouse that doubled as Ghostbusters HQ in the original 1984 movie — ahead of the world premiere of the latest installment in the supernatural film series.
“She’s everything to me and I wanted to make it as special as I could for her. No she had no idea I was going to do this today,” Dittebrand, 42, told The Post. “This is Mecca for her! You know, where Ghostbusters originated. It’s the best place in the world for her.”
Cartwright, 37, said yes faster than a Slimer attack although she said she had no idea he was planning to pop the question.
“In the back of my head, I was thinking: ‘If he doesn’t ask here, he’s never going to ask,” she told The Post.
The couple, who revealed they have a “shrine to Ghostbusters” in their home, had made the trek with dozens of other Ghostbusters fans to see a temporary “frozen installation” by the FDNY and movie producers that made the iconic firehouse appear as if it were wrapped in thick icicles as part of the media blitz on the day of the premiere of “Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire.”
After its debut at AMC Lincoln, the movie will be released to theaters on March 22.
Stars McKenna Grace, Logan Kim, Ernie Hudson, and director Gil Kenan showed up for the event and were greeted by about 250 rabid fans, many in costume.
That left the upcoming film’s younger stars Grace and Kim shocked by the massive “Stay Puft Marshmallow Man” sized crowd on Tribeca’s Moore Street, which included fans from as far as Australia.
Grace told The Post that she was enjoying her time in the Big Apple as she signed autographs.
“[It’s] really nice. It makes me happy,” she said.
Cartwright was one of the lucky fans who got an autograph from the 17-year-old actress, who excitedly told The Post that the movie stars were “very sweet.”
“I’m here today to feel a childhood dream,” Vicky Horner, 42, of London, told The Post. “I saw ‘Ghostbusters 2’ when I was 9 and I fell in love with the story and the characters.”
For Horner, her trip to New York was more than just seeing the Ghostbusters Firehouse, she got engaged on top of the Empire State Building to her fiancé whom she met through their mutual love of the franchise.
“I proposed the other day at the Empire State Building because I didn’t want this to all be about ‘Ghostbusters,'” her fiancé Michael Koske, 52, said.
Many fans weren’t there for romance and just wanted to see the famous firehouse and attend the premiere of the new film — the fourth in the franchise.
Superfan, Andrew Bayliss, 39, flew 24 hours from Melbourne, Australia, for the premiere tonight.
“I would never miss it,” he said. “I fell in love with ‘Ghostbusters’ as a child. It was my first love really.”
Bayliss found about the event through a Facebook group.
Nicole Fitch, 46, of Detroit came to the event dressed as Janine — Annie Pott’s receptionist character — with 15 others from her local fan group.
The firehouse will remain cover in ice for a “few weeks,” Fire Commissioner Laura Kavanagh said a press conference outside the building Thursday.
CPR classes will be offered until March 23, and firefighters will be giving out smoke alarms and safety pamphlets.
