Broadway Across Canada’s Production of ‘Beetlejuice’ plays at the Southern Alberta Jubilee Auditorium in Calgary until Jan. 12. The production opened on Broadway in 2019 and has been touring since January of 2023.
As per the original film, the Broadway adaptation is irreverent about death and several other big topics.
But, it’s different in that it’s more thoughtful about the motif of family. The story is focused more on the character Lydia’s journey and how she struggles with the grief of losing her mother. Despite the inclusion of more emotional moments and character vulnerabilities, all the many memorable parts of the movie have translated to the stage wonderfully.
The puppetry and costumes including the sand worm, the shriveled head adventurer, and the suicidal receptionist remain.
And, even without visual effects, the stage version of magic leaves audiences to wonder, ‘How did they do it?’
Megan McGinnis plays Barbara Maitland, one half of the couple whose death spurs the action of the story.
‘Beetlejuice’ has a whole plot to use their ‘recently deceased’ status as a stepping stone back to the land of the living.
Before death, the Maitlands dream of being parents, but are anxious about turning the page. Instead of readying a nursery, they come up with a thousand projects around the house which must be completed before they could have a child. Unfortunately, death does not wait for readiness, and their newly vacant house spurs the rest of the plot.
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McGinnis has been with the production for about 500 shows and said she can relate to the procrastination of parenthood in the Maitlands.
“Being an actor, when do you have a child? Certainly for us in the states maternity leave is not as accessible and as an actor we don’t really have it at all, so you have to choose to not work,” she explained.
McGinnis’ son, Beckett, is eight-years-old. This is the second time she’s done a Broadway tour since he was born.
She does eight shows a week, with one day off, and regardless of where she is on that one day off, she flies home to New Jersey to see her son. McGinnis spends just over 24 hours with her family before flying back to perform the next morning.
The first tour she did within Beckett’s lifetime, he toured with her. She said several other performers in the production take their family along with the tour, but at the age of eight, she and her husband decided it was better to give him some stability.
She said it’s important to take your kids as they are, and they knew he would do better to stay in his school.
“I think it is important for your children to see you following your dreams, and I am a better person when I am working. Would I prefer the work be at home? Of course! But that is just not what I was given right now,” McGinnis said.
She adds one of her favourite moments in the stage adaptation is a special moment between Lydia and her father towards the end, and how the Maitlands find the pseudo parent connection they craved by supporting it.
“I think that is what the show is about now,” McGinnis.
Listen to more of Andrea Montgomery’s conversation with Megan McGinnis below: