The actor who stunned Tim Burton: “I was amazed”
Tim Burton has his detractors, but no one can argue that his movies lack style. Since the 1980s, he’s been making films that are bursting with playfully macabre imagery and offbeat characters. He’s channelled his unique style into everything from Batman to Alice in Wonderland, but his most creatively masterful projects are the ones that come directly from his own imagination. Beetlejuice is the obvious frontrunner of all his films, while Edward Scissorhands and Corpse Bride provide a similar brand of quirky darkness that his fans love.
Michael Keaton has worked with Burton several times in both original movies and ones based on well-known intellectual property. Their first collaboration came in 1988 with Beetlejuice, in which the actor played the zany bio-exorcist of the title. Their collaboration was so enjoyable that Burton went out on a limb and insisted on casting the actor as Batman in his first big-budget production. It helped reshape Keaton’s career, transforming him from a comic actor to a major box office draw as a leading man.
For Keaton, Burton is a unique filmmaker because his artistry simply can’t be contained. “He is one of the few people I know that doesn’t have a choice,” the actor told journalist Robert J Emery in the book Directors: Take Three. “He is just an artist. It’s more of a choice for other people. I don’t think Tim Burton has a choice. He was born to be an artist.”
Anyone who has seen the director’s work would almost certainly agree. Only Wes Anderson can beat him on distinctiveness. From the beginning, Burton tapped into a fandom for horror that was also funny and full of heart, a niche where the monsters can be the good guys without always being tragic figures.
To achieve his unique vision, Burton has a handful of actors with whom he has worked time and time again, including Winona Ryder, Johnny Depp, and his former partner Helena Bonham Carter. However, the director had particularly high praise for Keaton as a collaborator, saying that he discovered early in the production of Beetlejuice that they were on the same wavelength.
“Michael is brilliant,” the director told Emery, saying that the actor was full of energy and loved doing improv. While working on Beetlejuice, Burton said he would go to Keaton’s house and riff. “He would come up with voices and stuff like that,” he remembered. “It was a very creative process, and I was just amazed by his humour and energy and ability.”
Although Keaton has enjoyed success throughout his career independently of Burton, it’s clear that the two were perfect collaborators. He’s excelled in dramatic roles in the latter part of his career, including in 2014’s Birdman, which referenced his character in Batman, and 2015’s Spotlight. But there is a freedom to his performances in Burton movies that is often missing from his other work.
It is also true that the actor stars in three of Burton’s best films – Beetlejuice, its sequel, and Batman. Although they might seem like they belong on two very different sides of the creative spectrum, Burton and Keaton might just be two peas in a pod.
