'Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice’ ... Don’t Say It A Third Time, Are You Crazy?

It’s (almost) showtime!

The sequel to one of my favorite movies, Beetlejuice, will finally arrive in theaters on September 6. The trailer for the appropriately named Beetlejuice Beetlejuice dropped on Wednesday. Let’s take a look.

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Wait, how did we get here?

There’s been talk of a Beetlejuice sequel since 1990. Director Tim Burton hired Jonathan Gems (Mars Attacks) to write a script called Beetlejuice Goes Hawaiian. Gem said, “Tim thought it would be funny to match the surfing backdrop of a beach movie with some sort of German Expressionism, because they’re totally wrong together.” I’m not sure he needed to explain the joke to us. No one confuses The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari with Gidget.

The title Beetlejuice Goes Hawaiian promised such absurdity I was obsessed with the potential sequel. Kevin Smith was approached to revise the script in the mid-1990s but he’s joked that he thought the original Beetlejuice said everything it needed to say. (Never!)

Gems released a statement in 1997 declaring the sequel deader than Beetlejuice himself:

“The Beetlejuice Goes Hawaiian script is still owned by The Geffen Company and it will likely never get made. You really couldn't do it now anyway. Winona is too old for the role, and the only way they could make it would be to totally recast it.”

Winona Ryder was 26 in 1997, but this is Hollywood so they already had her playing shuffleboard at a nursing home.

The project bounced around for another decade. Seth Grahame-Smith, author of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter, announced in 2015 that his script for the sequel was ready. Ryder and Michael Keaton were both interested … and then nothing happened. USA Today wryly noted in 2019 that “Tim Burton’s ‘Beetlejuice’ sequel is stuck in the afterlife waiting room.”

I didn’t really believe it when I read in 2022 that Beetlejuice 2 was in early development. They’d never get the gang back together at that rate, and Burton was probably still serving time in an Australian penal colony for making Dumbo. Then I heard that Jenna Ortega (Wednesday) was cast as Lydia Deetz’s daughter, Astrid. (This is perfect casting because if Lydia Deetz were real, her daughter would be Jenna Ortega.) Everything started to move quickly: Ryder was back as Lydia. Keaton was back as the ghost with the most. Burton was directing, and my idol Danny Elfman was composing the score. That was my personal deal breaker. There’s no Beetlejuice without Elfman. I remember buying his Beetlejuice score back in 1991 and listening to it constantly. (It was also played during my wedding’s rehearsal dinner.) That opening theme is still funky.

So, let’s talk about this trailer!

The teaser trailer opens with Astrid (Ortega) riding her bike (without a helmet) through Winter River, Connecticut, the idyllic New England town from the first film. A somber version of Harry Belafonte’s “Day-O” plays. It seems as if a children’s choir is singing the song at a graveside funeral. That’s an interesting choice, as Adam and Barbara Maitland (Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis) were the Belafonte fans. Maybe the Deetzes grew to appreciate calypso while sharing their house with the Maitlands. This is probably Charles Deetz’s funeral. Jeffrey Jones, who played Charles, was arrested in 2002 for possession of child pornography. He reportedly paid a 14-year-old boy to pose for photographs that I can only describe as TRIGGER WARNING. So, yes, it’s probably best to write out his character in the first act.

Baldwin has his own legal problems right now, but I’m disappointed that Davis isn’t in the sequel. I adore her in general and think she’s a hilarious foil to the wackier characters in the first film. However, I am beyond thrilled that Catherine O’Hara has returned as my first love Delia Deetz. I frequently quote her in casual conversation. If you watch any home remodel shows on HGTV, you’ve seen a lot of Delias but none can match Ms. O’Hara.

Astrid enters her grandparents’ attic and removes the cover from Adam’s model of Winter River. Beetlejuice soon emerges from the model, and Lydia reacts in legitimate horror as he declares, “The juice is loose!”

How things have changed

Beetlejuice is the original film’s antagonist, and in earlier drafts of the film, he’s more terrifying than funny — a winged demon who assumes the form of a Middle-Eastern man for reasons I assume weren’t entirely racist. Hints of Beetlejuice’s truly monstrous nature still come through in the finished film, especially his less-than-hidden desires for Lydia, who’s only 14. Beetlejuice forcing Lydia to marry him is played for laughs in the film, but in the draft, his intent is clearly sexual assault.

Although Keaton’s Beetlejuice is less sinister than originally intended, the character was toned down even further for the spinoff cartoon that ran from 1989 to 1991. Beetlejuice (Stephen Ouimette) and Lydia (Alyson Court) are best friends who go on wacky adventures in the Netherworld. One episode features an alternate reality where they never met, and Lydia is lonely and miserable without her ghostly soulmate. She’s still a minor.

Lydia has a nine-year-old sister, Cathy, in Michael McDowell’s first draft. It’s a riff on the creepy girl in the haunted house from Poltergeist. Cathy’s the one who can see the Maitlands. Barbara’s line, “If I had seen a ghost at your age, I’d have been frightened out of my wits,” makes more sense if she’s not talking to a teenager.

The original ending had Charles and Delia moving back to New York and letting Lydia — who’s 14! — live with the Maitlands. It’s unclear how she was able to attend school with a haunted house as her address, but I think it’s a private girls school so they might look the other way as long as the checks clear. However, social services probably wouldn’t approve of ghostly shut-ins as guardians. I was 14 in 1988 and would’ve happily lived alone in Connecticut with Geena Davis (without Alec Baldwin), but child abandonment didn’t test well with audiences. The ending was changed to what we all saw.

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