Kristen Wiig has said she was taken by surprise after online trolls mounted a campaign against the new female-fronted remake of cult 80s favourite Ghostbusters.

Speaking to the Los Angeles Times, the star and Oscar-nominated co-writer of Bridesmaids said that she had not expected the film, in which she will co-star with Melissa McCarthy, Kate McKinnon and Leslie Jones, to attract such ire.

“The fact there was so much controversy because we were women was surprising to me,” said Wiig. “Some people said some really not nice things about the fact that there were women. It didn’t make me mad, it just really bummed me out. We’re really honouring those movies.”

In March, the new Ghostbusters director Paul Feig, who also directed Wiig and McCarthy in Bridesmaids, described criticism of the remake as “some of the most vile, misogynistic shit I’ve ever seen in my life”. Ernie Hudson, who played Winston Zeddemore in the 1984 version of the film, found himself embroiled in the controversy in 2014, after calling the remake “a bad idea”. However, he swiftly backtracked and now has a part in the film.

Further original cast members who have agreed to be in the new Ghostbusters include Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Sigourney Weaver and Annie Potts. Rick Moranis, who played the nerd accountant Louis Tully in the 1984 film and its 1989 sequel, has turned down the chance to appear in the remake, citing the flimsiness of the part on offer. Feig’s film, due in cinemas in July 2016, will also star Chris Hemsworth as the new team’s secretary.