After working with Tim Burton on the hit Netflix series, Wednesday, rising star Jenna Ortega is reportedly on track to re-team with the director for his next project: Beetlejuice 2, a direct sequel to the 1998 cult classic. Michael Keaton, who hasn’t been shy about reprising his most iconic roles, is set to come back as the foul-mouthed spirit. As for Ortega, she’s reportedly in talks to play the daughter of Winona Ryder’s character from the original film.
Via Variety:
The sequel has been in the works at Warner Bros. for some time before Brad Pitt’s production company Plan B officially boarded it in February of last year. The original “Beetlejuice” centers on Charles (Jeffrey Jones), Delia (Catherine O’Hara) and Lydia Deetz (Ryder), who inhabit a home previously occupied by the Maitlands (Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis). The Maitlands died in a car accident, but their ghost selves want to re-inhabit their former house, recruiting Beetlejuice (Keaton), a “bio-exorcist,” to scare away the Deetzes.
Ortega working with Burton again comes at an interesting time. She recently gave an interview where she claimed to have rewritten her lines for Wednesday because they were “boring.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever had to put my foot down on a set the way I had to on Wednesday,” Ortega said on the Armchair Expert podcast. “It’s so easy to fall into that category, especially in this type of show. Everything that she does, everything that I had to play, did not make sense for her character at all.”
Clearly, Ortega’s words didn’t affect her relationship with Burton one bit.
(Via Variety)