Michael Keaton and Winona Ryder to return for ‘Beetlejuice 2’ – report
After more than 30 years, Michael Keaton and Winona Ryder could potentially reprise their roles as Beetlejuice and Lydia Deetz in the upcoming film Beetlejuice 2.
Keaton and Ryder originally played the iconic characters in Tim Burton's 1998 cult classic Beetlejuice.
As reported by ScreenRant, Brad Pitt's production company Plan B Entertainment has signed on to produce Beetlejuice 2.
While the project hasn't been brought to Warner Bros. for an official greenlight just yet, filming could start as early as this coming summer with the original stars returning, according to Jeff Sneider's Hollywood Transom newsletter for The Ankler, which first broke the news.
EXCLUSIVE: Brad Pitt's company Plan B has come aboard to produce BEETLEJUICE 2, which could shoot this summer with original stars Michael Keaton and Winona Ryder reprising their roles. No Alec Baldwin though... https://t.co/XuCg0XVNdF pic.twitter.com/QeiK3BneUt
— Jeff Sneider (@TheInSneider) February 28, 2022
However, the project is still in early development with no script. While previous rumors state that Keaton and Ryder have expressed interest in reprising their roles, the casting news has not been officially confirmed.
Plan B Entertainment has produced a number of films over the years, including Oscar winners Moonlight, The Departed, and 12 Years a Slave.
The original film centers around Adam and Barbara Maitland, played by Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis, a married couple who die and remain as ghosts in their secluded house.
When a new family, the Deetzes—Charles (Jeffrey Jones), Delia (Catherine O'Hara), and their daughter Lydia (Ryder)—moves in against the Maitlands' wishes, the spirits of the deceased couple decide to hire a malicious "bio-exorcist" from the Netherworld who goes by the name Beetlejuice (Keaton) to get rid of the newcomers.
Beetlejuice was a critical and commercial success that ended up spawning an animated series in 1989, several video games in the early '90s, and even a stage musical adaptation on Broadway in 2019. The musical, which closed down due to the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, is set to reopen in April 2022.
Despite the original film's success, the long-rumored Beetlejuice sequel has struggled to get off the ground and has been in development hell for more than thirty years.
In April 2019, Warner Bros. stated that the project had been shelved.
"It’s funny, when I had met with Tim about it last, and we’re talking about five years ago at this point, the reason that it’s so hard to get going is because so many people love it and because there are 10 million ways to get that sequel wrong and four ways to get it right," said writer Seth Grahme-Smith in an interview with Collider in 2021. Grahme-Smith was previously tapped by Beetlejuice director Tim Burton to pen the sequel after working on 2012’s Dark Shadows.
"Michael Keaton is just as relevant as ever, and Tim Burton is just as relevant as ever, but you have to have both of those people excited about something to do it. I couldn’t get it there personally, as a writer, but maybe somebody else can," he added.
In recent years, both Keaton and Ryder, who were big stars in the ’80s and ’90s, have enjoyed a career resurgence on the small and big screen.
Keaton is reprising his role as Batman/Bruce Wayne in the DC Extended Universe’s The Flash, after last playing the role in 1992. He will also reprise the character in the Batgirl film starring Leslie Grace set for a release on HBO Max.
Ryder, who gained attention with her performance in Tim Burton’s Beetlejuice and 1990’s Edward Scissorhands, has starred as Joyce Byers in the popular Netflix science fiction horror series Stranger Things since 2016.