Beetlejuice (1988)
Alec Baldwin: Adam
Photos
Quotes
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Adam : What are your qualifications?
Beetlejuice : Ah. Well... I attended Juilliard... I'm a graduate of the Harvard business school. I travel quite extensively. I lived through the Black Plague and had a pretty good time during that. I've seen the EXORCIST ABOUT A HUNDRED AND SIXTY-SEVEN TIMES, AND IT KEEPS GETTING FUNNIER EVERY SINGLE TIME I SEE IT... NOT TO MENTION THE FACT THAT YOU'RE TALKING TO A DEAD GUY... NOW WHAT DO YOU THINK? You think I'm qualified?
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Adam : You can see us without the sheets?
Lydia : Of course I can see you.
Adam : Well, how is it you see us and nobody else can?
Lydia : Well, I've read through that handbook for the recently deceased. It says: 'live people ignore the strange and unusual". I myself am strange and unusual.
Barbara : You look like a regular girl to me.
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Barbara : [after Jane did not hear Adam call her] She didn't see you, right?
Adam : Unh-uh.
Barbara : [reading the handbook] In the book: "Rule Number Two: the living usually won't see the dead".
Adam : 'Won't' or 'can't'?
Barbara : It just says 'won't'. God, this book is so stupid. I can't understand anything in it.
[Adam takes the book and closes it]
Adam : Barb, honey... we're dead. I don't think we have very much to worry about anymore.
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Adam : Can you be scary?
Beetlejuice : Oh, thanks for asking
[turns around, imitates jerking-off]
Beetlejuice : . Can I be scary? What do you think of this?
[makes a horrific image we don't see]
Beetlejuice : You like it?
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Adam : Cabin fever, hon?
Barbara : Well, I can't clean anything properly. The vacuum's out in the garage and we can't leave the house. Why don't they tell us something? I mean, where are all the other dead people in the world? Why is it just you and me?
Adam : Maybe this is heaven.
Barbara : In heaven there wouldn't be dust on everything.
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Beetlejuice : I gotta card around here, somewhere. Here, here. Who do I have to kill? Here hold that for me, would ya?
[hands Barbara a rat]
Barbara : Whoa! AHH!
Beetlejuice : There. There ya go.
Adam : You don't have to kill anybody!
Beetlejuice : Ah, possession! Good.
Barbara : [In Betelgeuse's voice] Learn to throw your voice! Fool your friends! Fun at parties!
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Juno : [as Adam and Barbara come back to the afterlife] You two have really screwed up! I received word that you allowed yourselves to be photographed, and you let Betelgeuse out and didn't put him back, and you let Otho get hold of the handbook!
Adam : Handbook? When?
Juno : [rolls her eyes] Never trust the living! We cannot have a routine haunting like yours provide proof that there is existence beyond death.
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Lydia : Are you the guys hiding out in the attic?
Adam : We're ghosts!
Lydia : What do you look like under there?
Adam : Aren't you scared?
Lydia : I'm not scared of sheets. Are you gross under there? Are you "Night of the Living Dead" under there? Like all bloody veins and pus?
Adam : Night of the what?
Lydia : Living Dead. It's a movie.
Barbara : You know, if I had seen a ghost at your age I would have been scared out of my wits.
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Adam : [In a decomposed state and trying to say Beetlejuice's name three times] BEH...
[his mouth falls out]
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Barbara : What's wrong?
Lydia : Beetle...
Barbara : Shhh!
Lydia : HE told me that if I could let him out, he would take me to the other side to find you.
Barbara : Lydia, we're dead.
Lydia : Well, I want to be dead too.
Barbara : No! Lydia, being dead really doesn't make things any easier.
Adam : Listen to her on this, Lydia, this is something we know a lot about!
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Beetlejuice : I'm feeling a little, ooh, anxious if you know what I mean. It's been about six hundred years after all. I wonder where a guy, an everyday Joe like myself, can find a little action...
[a brothel appears]
Beetlejuice : [dances with joy] Hey, Adam, nice move!
Barbara : Adam, why did you build that?
Adam : I didn't!
[Adam and Barbara appear at Juno's office]
Juno : The whorehouse was my idea! I want you to get Beetlejuice out of the picture!
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Barbara : What about that guy in the flyer, you know Betel...
Juno : Shhh! Don't even say his name! You don't want his help!
Adam : We might.
Juno : No, you don't! He does not work well with others.
Barbara : What do you mean?
Juno : I didn't want to bring it up, but rather than have you stumble on to it and make another mistake, I'll tell you. He was my assistant, but he was a troublemaker. Went out on his own as a freelance bio-exorcist. Claimed he could get rid of the living. Got into more trouble. In fact, I believe he's been sleazing around your cemetery lately. The only way he can be brought back is by calling his name three times. But I strongly suggest you get the Deetzes out by yourselves.
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Juno : Okay, have you been studying the manual?
Adam : Well, we tried.
Juno : The intermediate interface chapter on haunting says it all: get them out yourselves, it's your house. Haunted houses aren't easy to come by.
Barbara : Well, we don't quite get it.
Juno : I heard. Tore your faces right off. It obviously doesn't do any good to pull your heads off in front of people if they can't see you!
Adam : We should start more simply then?
Juno : Start simply, do what you know, use your talents, practice! You should have been studying those lessons since day one.
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Juno : So, I don't care what it takes! You get the Deetz's out of there now!
[Barbara and Adam stand up, getting ready to leave]
Juno : Ooh, wait!
[They sit back down]
Juno : What are you going to do?
[No response]
Juno : To scare them! I want to make sure it's not some silly parlor trick.
Adam : I'll go first, honey.
[Barbara nods and mouths the word "Okay", as Adam takes off his glasses and contorts his face into a hideous, grotesque new face, while plucking out his eyes and using them for fingers]
Juno : Not bad, not bad.
[Points over to Barbara]
Juno : Now, you.
[Barbara hesitates]
Juno : Go ahead.
[Barbara thinks for a minute, then rolls her eyes all the back, pops them to the back of her head, then grotesquely pulls contorts her face to hideous feature, with mouth wide open and her eyes appearing in the back of her throat]
Juno : Okay... you look great! Now, go clean house and don't forget the photographs and the damn handbook!
[They get up and leave as the football players return]
Very Dumb Football Player : Coach?
Juno : What?
Very Dumb Football Player : I don't think we survived that crash?
Juno : [Sarcastically] How did you guess?
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Lydia : You're not gross. Why are you wearing sheets?
Barbara : We're Practicing.
Adam : You can see us without the sheets.
Lydia : [seriously] Of course I can see you.
Adam : Well, how else if you see us and nobody else can?
Lydia : Well I read through that handbook for the recently deceased. It says, 'Live people ignore the strange and unusual.' I myself am strange and unusual.
Barbara : You like a regular girl to me.
Adam : You read our book?
Lydia : Yeah.
Adam : You could follow it?
Lydia : Yeah. Why are you guys creeping around in Delia's bedroom?
Adam : Well, we were trying to scare your mother.
Lydia : Stepmother.
Lydia : [continues] Anyway, you can't scare her. She's sleeping with Prince Valium tonight.
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[Adam and Barbara struggle to understand the "Handbook for the Recently Deceased"]
Barbara : I hate this. Just can you give me the basics?
Adam : Well, this book isn't arranged that way. What do you wanna know?
Barbara : Well, why did you disappear when you stepped off the porch? Are we halfway to heaven? Are we halfway to hell? And... how long is this gonna last?
Adam : I don't see anything about heaven OR hell. This book reads like stereo instructions. Listen to this: "Geographical and temporal perimeters. Functional perimeters vary from manifestation to manifestation.
[Snaps book shut]
Adam : Oh, this is gonna take some time, honey.
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Adam : I forgot to lock the attic door!
