Exclusive: Johnny Depp In Talks For Beetlejuice 2
According to our trusted and proven sources, Johnny Depp might be up for a role in the much-longed-for Beetlejuice 2.
This article is more than 2 years old
We should be long past the idea that there is any intellectual property that cannot (or should not) be franchised, rebooted, or get a decades-late sequel. In the lattermost case, the recent, massive success of Tom Cruise’s Top Gun: Maverick made it all but certain that studios will be looking back to the 1980s to see what they can wring some box office bucks out of. According to our trusted and proven sources, this has resulted in Johnny Depp being courted to appear in the upcoming Beetlejuice 2. While Depp was not actually a cast member of the original 1988 Tim Burton film, it seems some producer out there feels Johnny Depp has been successfully rehabilitated to the point of sticking him in the sequel to one of the more beloved cult classics of the 1980s.
To be fair, in some ways Johnny Depp makes a lot of sense to appear in a Beetlejuice sequel. He has a longstanding relationship with director Tim Burton, having appeared in eight of his films, including the critically acclaimed Ed Wood, the beloved Edward Scissorhands, and a number of lesser movies in which Depp is not named some variation of Ed. Johnny Depp has also previously shown himself highly successful at quirky characters in supernaturally-tinged franchises like Pirates of the Caribbean. Finally, Johnny Depp has increasingly shown an ability to play creepy characters in the Fantastic Beasts franchise and Murder on the Orient Express that could potentially work very well for Beetlejuice 2.
However, the possible casting of Johnny Depp in a Beetlejuice sequel does open a whole lot of cans of worms (which Beetlejuice himself would probably love, but we digress). For one thing, the announced Beetlejuice sequel is said to have already secured original stars Michael Keaton and Winona Ryder. While that is most definitely a plus for fans, the fact that Johnny Depp and Winona Ryder had a very public relationship in the past might create some unintended subtext in Beetlejuice 2. Then again, all sorts of people have worked with their ex-partners in the past, so perhaps they could work through it.
But in a potentially more catastrophic way, Johnny Depp could bring some bad press to Beetlejuice 2. Depp has effectively been out of work in Hollywood for the last several years, after a combination of allegations of abuse from his estranged former spouse Amber Heard and reports of increasingly erratic behavior (originally in a widely read piece in Rolling Stone). There have been signs as of late that studios are cautiously interested in bringing Depp back into the big leagues, while he has already begun work on films in Europe. Given that Disney feels secure enough in Johnny Depp’s public image to add Captain Jack Sparrow back to the Pirates of the Caribbean ride, it certainly seems possible that Beetlejuice 2 might take a chance on him. There have been potential plans for a sequel to the supernatural horror-comedy classic for decades, so hopefully, it does not get derailed at the very last minute by arguments over Johnny Depp.
