Catherine O’Hara reminisces about having “such a crush” on her friend and co-star John Candy.

The lead in the upcoming film Argylle shares with PEOPLE that the comedian’s benevolent and generous nature captivated her during their collaboration in Toronto’s Second City comedy troupe and the subsequent SCTV show, spanning from 1976 to 1984. “He was just as lovely as you want him to be,” reflects the 69-year-old actress on Candy, who passed away in 1994.

Her sentiments, however, remained unreciprocated, as O’Hara acknowledges Candy was already committed to his wife Rosemary, a union that endured until his passing.

“I wouldn’t claim he was interested in me that way,” she notes. “But he was always really lovely to me in Second City Theater.”Joining the cast in the 1970s after waitressing at the venue, O’Hara credits Candy for assisting in honing her skills.

“He would always be willing to do an improv with me after the show. You do a show and then you do improvs after the show. That’s how you build the next show at Second City Theater. And he was always willing to try any idea,” she recounts. He would frequently engage with fans, too, using the two rules of improvisational comedy: “yes, and…” as well as “no, but…”

“People always say ‘yes, and…’ but ‘no, but…’ is just as important,” she elucidates. “ ‘Are you the doctor?’ ‘No, but I played one in commercials.’ He was the king of that.” “You’d be on the street with him, in a mall, and somebody would come up and just want to do a comedy bit with him, and he would always pick up on it right away and give something back and see their eyes light up, like, ‘Oh, I’m doing a bit with John Candy,’ ” she reminisces.

“It’s so nice to be able to not have to make up any bull because people loved him,” she expresses. “And when people ask, ‘What was he like?’ they want to hear what they think he’d be like. And it’s so lovely to be able to validate their guesses about what he would be like in person.”

The star of Uncle Buck and The Great Outdoors “was just so generous and larger than life. Maybe not larger, but [what] life was supposed to be,” she says.

O’Hara shared the screen with Candy in the 1990 Christmas classic Home Alone, a film she fondly labels as a “perfect movie.” Candy portrayed Gus, the “Polka King of the Midwest,” offering O’Hara’s character a ride to reunite with her son, played by Macaulay Culkin.