After leading the latest Scream movies and Netflix’s Wednesday cast, Jenna Ortega is continuing her reign as this generation’s resident Scream Queen with the upcoming Beetlejuice sequel, reuniting the actress with Tim Burton.
Beetlejuice 2—officially called Beetlejuice Beetlejuice—will expand the story of one of Tim Burton’s best movies. The original 1988 horror-comedy follows Michael Keaton’s “bio-exorcist” Betelgeuse, who is hired by a pair of ghosts (played by Geena Davis and Alec Baldwin) to scare out the new inhabitants of their old home, the Deetz family, portrayed by Jeffrey Jones, Catherine O’Hara and Winona Ryder.
The sequel will awesomely see many of those performers reprising their iconic roles, including Ryder as Lydia Deetz. As Ortega revealed in a recent Vanity Fair article, her character is very much connected to the original Beetlejuice cast, saying:
I don’t know how much I’m allowed to say, but I am Lydia Deetz’s daughter, so I’ll give that away. She’s weird, but in a different way and not in the way you’d assume, I would say. The relationship between Lydia and Astrid, my character, is very important. And it’s also really strange because it’s a lot of catching up and putting the pieces together of what’s gone on in Lydia’s life since, which is nice, I think, for anybody who loves the character and is excited to see her again.
As many fans theorized, Ortega will play Astrid, the daughter of Ryder’s Lydia Deetz. It’s a bit of a passing-the-torch casting, as Winona Ryder is herself a generational horror icon thanks to roles in Edward Scissorhands, Heathers and Bram Stoker’s Dracula.
The 21-year-old actress said that Astrid will butt heads with her famously “strange and unusual” onscreen mother, telling the outlet about the young character:
[Laughs.] I wouldn’t say she’s bright and sunny at all. She doesn’t go to the opposite end of the spectrum, but any kid who becomes a teenager wants to be removed from their parents. I think they instantly just fight whatever it is that their parent loves. So I think it’s a little bit of that. I’m not wearing pink and a cheerleader, but I am a little bit against my mom’s history or past. We butt heads quite a bit.
Ortega also shared why she’s excited that the powers that be are bringing back “weird, strange, off-putting stories” like Beetlejuice to theaters:
That’s why I was excited that they were bringing it back as well. I feel like studios nowadays, of course they want people in seats and you’ve got to do reboots or sequels or things like that to get people entwined, but to bring Beetlejuice back—of all of the stories—is so good because people need to revisit weird, strange, off-putting stories again. We need to introduce the younger generation that’s always on the phone to new artistic and creative ideas. The weirder you get with it, the more people you can get to see it, I think will probably do a lot for film in general.
Among those returning to the Beetlejuice universe are Keaton, Ryder and O’Hara. Monica Bellucci, Willem Dafoe and Justin Theroux will join Ortega as newcomers to the ghoulish world.
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is one of the most anticipated titles on the upcoming 2024 movie schedule, with the sequel set for a September 6 release date. As such, CinemaBlend will keep you posted on any and all Deetz family developments!