Although her hairstyle appears to have remained the same, Winona Ryder had her work cut out for her in updating the character of Lydia Deetz.
The Beetlejuice Beetlejuice star said the role in Tim Burton‘s upcoming sequel, which premieres Sept. 6, was “hard to imagine” as an adult after first playing Lydia as a death-obsessed gothic teenager in the original 1988 movie
“I think certainly, I never pictured Lydia either having children or in any type of relationship,” Ryder told Slash Film. “I just always thought she was just probably in her own world as she got older. Just sort of in the attic and happy, but alone.”
She credited the casting of Jenna Ortega as Lydia’s daughter Astrid and Justin Theroux as her boyfriend Rory with helping her shape the grown-up version of her character, who is now a TV personality.
“I think once we got there and once Jenna and I bonded and once Justin came on board…” Ryder began to explain. “I mean, I think everyone who’s as old as I am now, we’ve all been in those things where you’re just like, ‘What was I thinking, in terms of the relationship I have?’ But I don’t know what young Lydia, I don’t think she would ever have expected to be in front of a camera.”
Michael Keaton and Winona Ryder in Beetlejuice (1988). (Warner Brothers/Courtesy Everett Collection)
Along with Burton and Ryder, original co-stars Michael Keaton and Catherine O’Hara are back for the sequel, which also features Monica Bellucci, Willem Dafoe, Burn Gorman, Danny DeVito, Arthur Conti and Filipe Cates.
In Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, Lydia returns home with daughter Astrid after the death of her father Charles (originally played by Jeffrey Jones). There, the rebellious teen discovers a portal to the afterlife and unwittingly unleashes the titular ghoul.