Catherine O'Hara, star of Tim Burton's Beetlejuice, has joined the cast of the upcoming sequel.
As reported by The Direct, O'Hara reportedly signed on for Beetlejuice 2, joining other returning stars like Winona Ryder and Michael Keaton. However, her involvement has not been officially confirmed. In 2016, the Home Alone actor expressed interest in a Beetlejuice sequel, along with her production designer husband Bo Welch. "I wish I could do it but I haven't heard anything. I met my husband on that movie, he designed the sets, so we would both love to be involved," O'Hara said. "But, like you, I keep hearing about it every once in a while but it doesn't seem to go anywhere. I don't know, I'd love to see it, I'd love to be in it."
The idea for a sequel to 1988's Beetlejuice was tossed around for several years. In February 2022, Brad Pitt's production company, Plan B, confirmed the development of Beetlejuice 2. In the summer of 2022, they hoped cameras would start rolling but that plan never came to fruition. Previously, Keaton didn't think a sequel to Beetlejuice was the right idea. "The only way to do it is to do it right. So much of it was improvised and so much was beautifully handmade by the artist that is Tim Burton," the actor said. "If you can't get close to that, you leave it alone."
At 2022's Lumière Festival, Tim Burton denied his involvement in Beetlejuice 2 but later contradicted himself. "I only know if I'm making a film when I'm actually on the set shooting. I try to go back to the root of everything. It springs from a seed and then it grows, rather than out of these statements," Burton said. "I am working on ideas and things but it's all very early days. We'll see how it goes. How's that for a none answer."
Why Beetlejuice 2 Took So Long
Beetlejuice 2 writer Seth Grahame-Smith explained why it took so long for the sequel to get off the ground. "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 [Beetlejuice] and because there are 10 million ways to get that sequel wrong and four ways to get it right," he said.
Before Beetlejuice 2, Burton attempted to produce a follow-up film titled Beetlejuice Goes Hawaiian in the 1990s, but the potential sequel idea never went anywhere. "It's such a very fine needle to thread that I certainly like didn't get it there, on the script side," Grahame-Smith said.
Beetlejuice is available to stream on HBO Max. The sequel will premiere on an undetermined release date.
Source: The Direct