Tim Burton is set to return to the world of Beetlejuice, the 1988 supernatural fantasy which starred Michael Keaton as a garrulous ghost, reports The Wrap.
Keaton also looks likely to return to his best known role. The first film centred on a young, recently deceased couple (Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis) who find themselves haunting their old home. They enlist the help of Beetlejuice, a mischievous freelance “bio-exorcist” ghost, to scare away the obnoxious new family which movies in but soon discover they may have bitten off more than they can chew.
Storylines for the sequel remain shrouded in mystery but the screenplay is by Seth Grahame-Smith, who wrote Burton’s Dark Shadows, and David Katzenberg. Keaton is currently experiencing something of a career renaissance, with starring roles in the upcoming RoboCop remake and Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu comedy Birdman.
A sequel to Beetlejuice has been in the pipeline for decades, but plans for a follow-up which would have transferred the action to Hawaii (thankfully) never came to fruition. The follow-up is not likely to be Burton’s next film: the filmmaker is due to shoot fantasy movie Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, and Deadline reports that he has not yet read Grahame-Smith’s script.
