Michael Keaton teases ‘weird’ return in ‘Beetlejuice Beetlejuice’

Article content

NEW YORK CITY — If you’re of a certain age, you’ve probably wondered why we’re only now getting Beetlejuice Beetlejuice — the long-awaited sequel to 1988’s Beetlejuice.

Article content

Released 36 years ago this past March, the first comic-horror — which followed a newly dead couple (Geena Davis and Alec Baldwin) who hire the titular ghoul (Michael Keaton) in an attempt to scare away the Deetz family who’ve moved into their home — was an instant hit with audiences.

So reuniting Keaton with director Tim Burton and the original’s other co-stars, including Winona Ryder (Lydia Deetz) and Catherine O’Hara (Delia Deetz), seemed like a no-brainer.

Keaton and Burton had continued working together, bringing Batman to the screen in two superhero films, and collaborating again on 2019’s imaginative live-action remake of Dumbo. For years, they had talked about making a sequel, but the pair seesawed on whether it made sense to revisit the world of Beetlejuice again.

Article content

Article content

“Off and on, I had wanted to try to make it again over the years. But then I would think, ‘Just leave it alone,’” Keaton, 73, admits in a new interview.

After Beetlejuice, Batman and its sequel Batman Returns, Keaton went on to try different things, jumping into the world of Shakespeare (joining Kenneth Branagh’s Much Ado About Nothing and starring opposite Nicole Kidman My Life in 1993)

When the call came for a third Batman film, Keaton famously turned down a handsome cheque, embracing his life as a dad and opting to keep exploring different projects; returning to his comedic roots in 1996’s Multiplicity and working with Quentin Tarantino on 1997’s Jackie Brown. As the decades whizzed by, Keaton would lend his voice to various animated projects — including Cars, the Toy Story franchise, and the Minions movie). In 2014, Keaton earned his first best actor nod at the Academy Awards for playing a washed-up actor in Alejandro Inarritu’s dark comedy Birdman. The next year, he led Oscar-winning ensemble drama in Spotlight.

Article content

Keaton continued to earn steady praise, acting in 2020’s The Trial of The Chicago 7 and the 9/11 drama Worth. The following year, he played the doctor at the centre of America’s opioid crisis in Dopesick (a role which won him both an Emmy and Golden Globe). 

In those ensuing years, scripts for a Beetlejuice sequel would periodically land on Keaton’s desk; but none of them garnered much interest. “In the past, Tim and I would talk about it from time to time, so I thought it could be cool. But we didn’t see anything we liked or thought could be ‘it,’” Keaton says.

Then one day, out of the blue, Burton called and told him he finally had read something that recaptured the magic of the first film. “Tim got in touch with me and said, ‘I think I have a script that could work,’” Keaton recalls.

Article content

The new story he pitched would follow the mother-daughter duo of O’Hara and Ryder characters and add in Jenna Ortega, as Lydia’s quirky daughter, as a way to bring back Keaton’s eponymous “Ghost With the Most.”

Italian actress Monica Bellucci would show up as Beetlejuice’s estranged ex-wife, with Willem Dafoe and Justin Theroux joining in on the fun.

“When he got the script for Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, he was amazed,” Keaton says. “It’s a hard thing to capture, the tone of it. But the writers (Alfred Gough and Miles Millar) got really, really close.”

Keaton says that exploring the mother-daughter dynamic between O’Hara, Ryder and Ortega gives the sequel an emotional heft the original did not have.

And when it came time to put on Beetlejuice’s iconic pinstriped suit and slathering on the character’s white face makeup with black circles around the eyes and wild hair was like riding a bike.

Article content

“It was fun,” he says, chuckling. “Which is weird when you think about it. That says disturbing things about me, I’m sure. It was like, ‘Wow, here we go. Let’s go do this again.’”

Keaton was also excited to reunite with Ryder and O’Hara, and work with Ortega, who stars in Burton’s Wednesday series on Netflix. 

“The cast on the first one was great, but this one is even better. Everyone is so good. Willem is great, Justin is hysterical, Catherine’s always funny, she’s the goodness of comedy for most of us,” he says.

His homecoming as the mischievous demon follows his return as Batman in The Flash last year, a part he also reprised for a now-shelved Batgirl movie.

“It’s fun, right?” Keaton says of playing two of his most iconic screen characters back-to-back.

Article content

But he says stepping back into the shoes of Beetlejuice was a ball. “I loved doing Batman. Loved it. It was great. But Beetlejuice is more fun. He’s more fun than anything,” Keaton says as his eyes brighten.

During a packed day of press, Keaton knew he’d be repeatedly asked why the first film endured, with fans clamouring for a sequel. “I don’t know … I have no f***ing clue,” he says.

But along with his dramatic turn 1988’s Clean and Sober, he recognized Beetlejuice’s importance in cementing an acting career that was kickstarted in 1982, when he broke out in the Ron Howard comedy Night Shift.

“People knew of me, obviously, but it was my friend (and film critic) Elvis Mitchell that really shone a light on the fact that in the same year, Beetlejuice and Clean and Sober were released. But it was really Elvis who said, ‘Excuse me, does anyone else notice he did this and this?’” Keaton recalls. “I was grateful for that.”

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is now playing in theatres.

[email protected]

Article content