Barbara Maitland is one of the two main protagonists in Tim Burton's 1988 film Beetlejuice. She is the wife of Adam Maitland, the friend of Lydia Deetz and the enemy of Betelgeuse.
She is portrayed by Geena Davis.
Background[]
Personality[]
A woman of simple pleasures, Barbara prefers to spend her vacation at home, decorating her Victorian home in a quaint decor in favor of spending it in Jamaica. She partially regrets her unintended death wish when she and her husband return home as ghosts, as she not only gets cabin fever from being unable to leave the house (except for the Afterlife or to land on Saturn). She is irritated that she can no longer clean her home properly, as her vacuum is in the garage and she can't leave the house.
Physical Appearance[]
Role in the film[]
Barbara first appears greeting her husband, Adam and giving him a present to help complete his model of their hometown Winter River. They are excited to spend their vacation at home where they constantly visited by Barbara's cousin Jane Butterfield, a real estate agent who wants them to sell their home. Despite Barbara and Adam struggling to have children of their own, they refuse to sell their house. Later, they visit a hardware store owned by Adam and head back home but swerve to avoid hitting a dog, causing their car to fall off the bridge and sink into the river where they drown.
An amnesiac Barbara and Adam turn into ghosts and return to their home, having no memory of how they died. When Adam tries to leave and is gone for two hours due to having been teleported to one of Saturn’s moons, Barbara finds the Handbook for the Recently Deceased and point to Adam their lack of reflection in a mirror, making them realize that they are dead. They find no answers from the handbook on what to do about their deaths or how to move on. Soon after the Deetz family buys the house and begins renovating it to the matriarch, Delia Deetz’s taste. The Maitlands try various ways to scare the family out of the house to no avail as the family can’t see them. In frustration, Barbara tries to leave but gets teleported to Saturn and is nearly attacked by a Sandworm before Adam saves her. With no other options, they decide to hide away in the attic.
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- In a deleted scene, after Beetlejuice placed a metal mouthpiece on her mouth, Barbara ran out of the house and got a Sandworm to help her rather than being teleported there.
- According to Tim Burton, there were reasons why Barbara and Adam did not return for the 2024 sequel which include wanting to focus on a new set of characters and the actors who portrayed the Maitlands have aged significantly since the first movie’s release which would make them difficult the same age the Maitlands had died at.[1]
- It’s possible Barbara may have been infertile due to her sad reaction when Jane told her house was meant for a family, meaning she and Adam had been trying to have a child prior to the events of the film.
