The production of Beetlejuice 2 was just two days short of completion when the actors’ strike forced the project into shutdown. Thankfully, it’s now a wrap for the long-awaited sequel.
It didn’t take long for Beetlejuice 2 to wrap production – which is unsurprising, given how close it was to being completed before the actors’ strike caused an immediate shutdown on all major studio projects. As director Tim Burton has mentioned previously, the film was less than two days from completing its production schedule when it was shut down and now most projects are getting back to work, it didn’t take very long for Beetlejuice 2 to wrap things up.
As most of the film was in the can before the SAG-AFTRA strike, we imagine that Burton and his team managed to stay busy throughout the intervening months, presumably working on the post-production process. That certainly appears to be the case given that the movie remains on course to meet its September 2024 release date, as Dark Horizons notes that production has now wrapped.
In the sequel, Michael Keaton is back as the titular (and rather devious) bio-exorcist, and he’s accompanied by a couple of other returning faces including Winona Ryder as Lydia Deetz and Catherine O’Hara as Delia Deetz. Also in the cast are Jenna Ortega, Willem Dafoe, Justin Theroux, and Monica Bellucci. That’s quite the cast and we’re looking forward to seeing if this project will be a worthy companion to the beloved 1988 original.
When Beetlejuice 2 does finally emerge, it’ll mark the close of a project that has been chugging along in one form or another for over 30 years – Burton had begun work on a sequel as early as 1990, with Jonathan Gems the first of numerous screenwriters to have a go at writing a follow-up. The film finally went into production in 2022, based on a script by Alfred Gough and Miles Millar.
Beetlejuice 2 is currently scheduled for release on 6th September 2024.
Read more: The various attempts to make Beetlejuice 2