Beetlejuice 2: Which legendary actor did Michael Keaton replace?

what are you talking about After a terrible tragedy, the Dietz family returns to Winter River. Still haunted by the memory of Beetlejuice, Lydia finds her life turned upside down when her daughter Astrid, a rebellious teenager, accidentally opens a portal to the Beyond.

With both worlds in chaos, it’s only a matter of time before someone says Beetlejuice’s name three times and this prankster demon returns to wreak havoc…

Musical Chairs on “Beetlejuice” (1988)

When the first Beetlejuice project came out in the 1980s, Wes Craven (Dark Claws, Scream, etc.) directed the film, but the script wasn’t scary enough for his taste. So he gave up his place to Tim Burton, the producers’ second choice.

The latter wanted the singer, dancer, emperor and actor Sammy Davis Jr. (one of the director’s favorite actors as a child, who, among others, starred in Lewis Milestone’s Ocean’s Eleven in 1960, John Sturges’s Three Sergeants in 1962, Sweet Charity. By Bob Fosse in 1969 etc.) plays the main role.

But Warner was against the idea. The studio then offered Michael Keaton to Burton, who accepted after meeting him.

Note that Drew Barrymore and Alyssa Milano both auditioned for the role of Lydia Dietz before the producers decided to cast Winona Ryder.

When it was released in 1988, Beetlejuice grossed $75 million worldwide on a budget of $15 (it was Burton’s first successful film). By comparison, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice cost much more than its predecessor: $100 million.

Thank you life!

What prompted Tim Burton to make a sequel to Beetlejuice was none other than… life! Indeed, he says he is inspired by major life events such as the arrival of children – he had two with actress Helena Bonham Carter – and wanted to explore these events in Lydia, already played by Winona Ryder in 1988. He promises:

“His character made me want to do this second opus. It’s the character I feel closest to. All these years I had the impression that this character was “me. what happened to me

On the set of the series on Wednesday, he called the screenwriter and certain people on his team into his dressing room to tell him he wanted to continue Beetlejuice.

Beetlejuice 2 in theaters: 36 years later, has Tim Burton rediscovered the spirit of the film that inspired him?

Scale models… or not!

Behind the famous characters with shrunken heads are hidden actors whose dimensions are 1m70, so that after adding the heads they reach 1m80 in height. If the costumes completely covered the faces of the actors, Colin Atwood added small pieces of netting so they could still move.

Then the mouth and eye movements of the puppets were animated. The main challenge is that each puppeteer piloted 3 reduced heads (out of a total of 15) under the guidance of a puppet coordinator who himself took instructions from Tim Burton.

A major absence from the casting

If Tim Burton finds Winona Ryder, Michael Keaton or Catherine O’Hara in this second opus, there will be no trace of Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis, whose pair of ghosts is still one of the main plots of Beetlejuice. The director also explained this to People magazine:

“I didn’t want to just check all the boxes. So even though it was an incredible and very important part of the first installment, I wanted to focus on something else.”

When asked by Entertainment Tonight about her absence from the film, Geena Davis had a rather amusing answer: “Our heroes were frozen in time. My theory is that ghosts don’t age…not that I do!”

Beetlejuice 2: Tim Burton’s first film, released 36 years ago, is here!

Engine… Action!

Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice began filming on 10 May 2023 and lasted a total of 46 days (at Warner’s Leaversden Studios in the United Kingdom, with 5 days before flying to Vermont and Massachusetts in the United States).

Across the Atlantic, the Deetz House was built especially for the occasion, as was a new covered bridge replicating the original (the one where the Geena Davis-Alec Baldwin couple had an accident).

In London, the team took over an art gallery in Soho to depict the New York neighborhood of the same name, where Delia’s exhibition is to be held. Finally, a derelict boarding house dating back to 1820 became the grounds of Astrid’s school.