Juiced Up: Michael Keaton is The Rake's Issue 96 Cover Star

Michael Keaton is 73 and still ready to take on the world. He talks to Tom Chamberlin about his latest trio of films, including the follow-up to Beetlejuice that’s been nearly four decades in the making.

 Juiced Up: Michael Keaton is The Rake's Issue 96 Cover Star

"Are you recording this yet, as I love this stuff.”

Rarely does an actor insist on going on the record, and considering the conversation we were having was about my bad back, you’d have thought there wasn’t much reason to. You’d have been wrong. Michael Keaton is a great conversationalist: he speaks fast and, in the hour we chatted, he provided great stories and insight whatever the subject matter. I promise we got on to the subject of movies (he is a figure in the totem pole of Hollywood, after all), but it began with the bad back. 

“I have had a bad back for years,” he says. “It took me a long time to get it better. I used to play [ice] hockey, and that wasn’t good for me. Another person who has the same thing is Eric Clapton. Until you have back issues you can’t really explain it. When mine was horrific, my boy was small, and when you carry [your children], you put them on your hip; people laugh at it but it makes it much worse. When I shot Mr. Mom, they’d send a driver for work, but they had to send a station wagon for me so I could lie down.” This feature was filed alongside a letter to H.R. at Rake Towers requesting a budget for a station wagon. 

The good news (for me, anyway) is that you can get things back to normal: Michael is up and bouncy at 73, no sign of back issues and brimming with intense energy. He adds: “I have a hard time sitting still, anyone who knows me will tell you that.” 

That energy has been needed recently, for Keaton will have promoted three films by the end of the year, one of which (Knox Goes Away) he directed as well as starred in. The other two, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice and Goodrich, are two distinctly different performances, physically and thematically. In the former, he goes another (friendly/collegiate) round with the director Tim Burton, a pairing that sent Keaton stratospheric in 1988, when the first Beetlejuice film was released, and again in 1989, when he played the title role in Burton’s Batman

Because of my bad back, when I shot Mr. Mom they had to send a station wagon for me so I could lie down.

Hadley hand-tailored wool blend jacket, silk polo, cotton tailored trousers, silk twill scarf and pocket-square, Ralph Lauren Purple Label; brown loafers, Brunello Cucinelli; Perpetual 1908 in yellow gold, Rolex.
Hadley hand-tailored wool blend jacket, silk polo, cotton tailored trousers, silk twill scarf and pocket-square, Ralph Lauren Purple Label; brown loafers, Brunello Cucinelli; Perpetual 1908 in yellow gold, Rolex.
Hadley hand-tailored wool blend jacket, silk polo, cotton tailored trousers, silk twill scarf and pocket-square, Ralph Lauren Purple Label; Perpetual 1908 in yellow gold, Rolex.

Keaton’s path into entertainment did not appear to be written in the stars. His childhood in western Pennsylvania was more alfresco than his peers, with a lot of time spent enjoying the countryside or just out of the house with his six siblings. “We grew up outside Pittsburgh, working-class steel town,” he says. “We were between a railroad town and a mill town where my grandfather worked, but we were country kids, so I’d ride my bike to the dirty creek and fish with worms. We were lower-middle-class people and so we didn’t have anything fancy. I was always a lot more rural than my classmates.” 

Rural as he may have been, the great outdoors was not big enough to fill the space in his life that was waiting to be plugged by acting. As the youngest of seven, he had, as he describes it, a “built-in audience” at home. No other members of his family are in showbusiness, but he always had an imaginative way as a child. It was when his father won a small black-and-white television in a raffle — and with the neighbours coming over to watch it — that he discovered the possibilities of entertainment, a whole world where his imagination could roam beyond the creek between his two Pennsylvania towns. “On Saturday morning, when I didn’t have school, I would get up and watch westerns and world war II movies,” he says. 

At the same time, a full understanding of the dramatic arts was not quite realised. “I was never a theatre kid, I was just like my other buddies, and when 

I got to college I was curious about it, as my tight friends were mostly funny guys. I took two theatre classes, and I liked it well enough but it never took hold. I then had to drop out of school to make money. I would work different jobs to make money, like driving a cab, working at a restaurant, parking cars, but at night I auditioned and got a part in this David Rigg play with this good theatre company, and that is where I thought, Oh, I kind of like this. I didn’t realise anyone would review the play, and while at work a friend said I had a nice review. It turned out that a local independent paper gave me a nice mention. Doing that play is where I really thought, I could be good at this, I’m going to give it a real go. If I could make a living out of it that would really be something, but fame had nothing to do with it.” 

It was comedy that really inspired him. While his heroes growing up were baseball and football players, he was converted after a time to comic actors and stand-up comedians. He even tried his hand at stand-up as he sought to make his name in the business. After a few small, unnamed roles in the seventies, his career achieved lift-off in 1983, when Mr. Mom was released. 

The film was very much of its time, though not in a ‘problematic’ way; rather, the social commentary arising from a screwball comedy in which a man has to do the childcare while the mother goes out to work was well pitched in early eighties America. Despite his bad back, the film was a great success, and Keaton’s performance is still referenced. Leading roles would follow, like the 1984 title role of Johnny Dangerously, and things were going at a steady pace for him. But nothing could have prepared him for the end of the decade, which would turn him into a household name. In 1988 he had Beetlejuice, which would be a slow-burn cult film, and Clean and Sober. A year later he had another outing with Burton, as the title character of Batman

I had one or two Shakespeare classes, but I really didn’t get it. I told Kenneth he didn’t want me.

Kent hand-tailored chalkstripe double-breasted wool suit, silk polo and silk twill scarf, Ralph Lauren Purple Label; sunglasses, Garrett Leight; pocket-square, Anderson & Sheppard; Perpetual 1908 in yellow gold, Rolex.
Kent hand-tailored chalkstripe double-breasted wool suit, silk polo and silk twill scarf, Ralph Lauren Purple Label.
Kent hand-tailored chalkstripe double-breasted wool suit, silk polo and silk twill scarf, Ralph Lauren Purple Label; sunglasses, Garrett Leight; pocket-square, Anderson & Sheppard; Perpetual 1908 in yellow gold, Rolex.
Kent hand-tailored chalkstripe double-breasted wool suit, silk polo and silk twill scarf, Ralph Lauren Purple Label; sunglasses, Garrett Leight; pocket-square, Anderson & Sheppard; Perpetual 1908 in yellow gold, Rolex.

His ventures with Burton over the years — their recent reunion for Beetlejuice 2 has been a runaway success — is an example of a rare alchemy between actor and director that actors might spend their entire careers searching for. Michael places great importance on these kinds of relationships. “Tim and I, I can’t tell you what it is,” he says. “I am not being coy, I just can’t. In a lot of ways he and I are similar, but in many we aren’t similar — but even that makes it work. That is a trust situation, and I knew that from the get-go. I knew this guy had something, he is an artist, he is original, and I liked being around it, and we trusted each other. Trust is the key.” 

It hasn’t always been smooth sailing, of course. For example, his Oscar-nominated performance in 2014’s Birdman involved a different dynamic. “I got a text yesterday from Alejandro [González Iñárritu, the director of Birdman] — we have stayed good friends, but he is a tough one, you know,” Keaton says. I ask if he means strict. “No, no, strict is, I am a nice person but I don’t take shit from anybody. Strict is like student-teacher, and that’s not how this works. I mean he is tough on people — he is very demanding, and some people don’t deal well with it. I loved working with him and I loved that project a lot, but I had to make sure we were equals, and it worked out just fine.” 

The actor-director dynamic was equally important for him in less familiar territory, as with Shakespeare, when he was cast in the 1993 production of Much Ado About Nothing, starring and directed by Kenneth Branagh. “Branagh had to talk me into it,” Michael says. “I had one or two 

Shakespeare classes, but I really didn’t get it. So I told Kenneth he didn’t want me. I asked him to give me some time to think about it. Dogberry [the self-satisfied constable in Much Ado] never made me laugh, so I went back and said, ‘Here is how you do it’. I created this guy who was a little dangerous — there was a guy my father worked with who was a justice of the peace, and he always seemed a little tricky to me; I thought that I could only do [the role] if I tried to be that guy.” 

It is hard to refer to Beetlejuice 2 as a sequel, as it has been nearly 40 years since the original film, but long-term returns like this are not entirely unfamiliar — see the Ghostbusters films and Top Gun: Maverick, of course. But this amount of time passing, and the experience gained in the intervening years, presumably changes an actor and his processes. Michael has his own take: “Essentially not much has changed, but if you’re paying attention and have some kind of consciousness, you’re a better person, and the longer you live you can’t help but gain knowledge. There’s a lot more to draw from today as a result. There is more simplicity in trusting that you just know. Alejandro paid me a compliment, saying, ‘He is the most confident actor I know’. And I don’t think I take things really seriously, but I take them serious enough. When I am in it, I am in it, and I respect it. Me as a person is not that different.” 

Kent hand-tailored chalkstripe double-breasted wool suit, shirt and wool tie, Ralph Lauren Purple Label; Perpetual 1908 in yellow gold, Rolex.
Kent hand-tailored chalkstripe double-breasted wool suit, shirt and wool tie, Ralph Lauren Purple Label; Perpetual 1908 in yellow gold, Rolex.
Kent hand-tailored chalkstripe double-breasted wool suit, shirt and wool tie, Ralph Lauren Purple Label; Perpetual 1908 in yellow gold, Rolex.
Kent hand-tailored chalkstripe double-breasted wool suit, silk polo and silk twill scarf, Ralph Lauren Purple Label; sunglasses, Garrett Leight; pocket-square, Anderson & Sheppard; Perpetual 1908 in yellow gold, Rolex.
Kent hand-tailored chalkstripe double-breasted wool suit, silk polo and silk twill scarf, Ralph Lauren Purple Label; sunglasses, Garrett Leight; pocket-square, Anderson & Sheppard; Perpetual 1908 in yellow gold, Rolex.
Kent hand-tailored chalkstripe double-breasted wool suit, silk polo and silk twill scarf, Ralph Lauren Purple Label; sunglasses, Garrett Leight; pocket-square, Anderson & Sheppard; Perpetual 1908 in yellow gold, Rolex.
Kent hand-tailored chalkstripe double-breasted wool suit, silk polo and silk twill scarf, Ralph Lauren Purple Label; sunglasses, Garrett Leight; pocket-square, Anderson & Sheppard; Perpetual 1908 in yellow gold, Rolex.
Kent hand-tailored chalkstripe double-breasted wool suit, silk polo and silk twill scarf, Ralph Lauren Purple Label; sunglasses, Garrett Leight; pocket-square, Anderson & Sheppard; Perpetual 1908 in yellow gold, Rolex.

Production: Copious Management
Grooming: Marissa Machado at Prtnrs
Photography Team: Nick Grennon, Nicholas Sansone
Digital Technician
: Juan Herrera