Beetlejuice
October 27 / 7:30 pm
Starring Michael Keaton, Geena Davis & Alec Baldwin |
A recently-deceased husband and wife commission a bizarre demon to drive an obnoxious family out of their home.
Michael Keaton has said that this 1988 Box Office Blockbuster is his favorite film in which he appears. This is a bit of a surprise considering Keaton nearly turned down the role. At first, he says, he just didn’t get the concept when he read the script. It took a meeting with Tim Burton to help him understand the vision. According to Keaton, the Beetlejuice character was described to him by Director Burton as “having lived in every time period but no time period.” Keaton used this as the jumping-off point to create the character with such features as a shock hairdo, mold make-up, and large teeth. He said that when he first showed up to the set as Beetlejuice, the crew was chanting: “Juice, Juice, Juice!” This got Keaton excited for his role, and the rest, as they say, his history!
According to Tim Burton, the studio originally wanted to call the film House Ghosts. As a joke, Tim Burton suggested the name Scared Sheetless and was horrified when the studio actually considered using it.
Along with Spaceballs (1987), Big (1988), and Caddyshack II (1988), the film is notable for containing the “f” word in a film rated PG during the PG-13 era.
The skeleton head on top of Betelgeuse’s Merry-Go-Round looks remarkably like Jack Skellington, a skeleton figure which Tim Burton had been drawing since 1982, and would ultimately be used as the main character of The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993), which Burton co-wrote and produced.
Although the character’s true name is Betelgeuse, it was spelled “Beetlejuice” in the title because it’s funnier and markets better..
Beetlejuice
Friday ONLY! October 27, 7:30pm
1988 Rated PG | Runtime 1hr, 16 Min