Catherine O’Hara wanted more energy in Beetlejuice’s possessed dinner party, co-star Jeffrey Jones recalled in 2018. Her suggestion of calypso sent him back to the records he’d heard as a child, including Harry Belafonte’s “Day-O (The Banana Boat Song),” which became the soundtrack to Delia Deetz and her guests’ involuntary performance.
The scripted choice had been the Ink Spots’ “If I Didn’t Care,” a 1939 recording. It appears in Warren Skaaren’s August 1986 second draft and was still there in the revised script dated February 3, 1987. An even earlier version by Michael McDowell had no musical number at dinner, writer Larry Wilson recalled: spilled wine triggered vines that wrapped around the guests.
Jones, who played Delia’s husband Charles, credited O’Hara with the calypso idea. His own suggestions included Lord Invader’s “Yankee Dollar” or “Rum and Coca Cola,” along with “Day-O,” remembered from childhood 78-rpm records.
Licensing costs also shaped the choice. The planned R&B selections were reportedly too expensive, while Jones remembered “Day-O” as affordable. His estimate was tentative: “I think it was like $300 to do it?”
Belafonte gave his approval after David Geffen, whose company backed the movie, called him in 1986 or early 1987. “I liked the idea of ‘Beetlejuice.’ I liked him. And I agreed to do it,” Belafonte recalled.
The music change reached beyond the dinner table. Skaaren’s script called for Percy Sledge’s “When a Man Loves a Woman” during Lydia’s finale; the finished film used Belafonte’s “Jump in the Line.” In all, 4 Belafonte recordings appear in Beetlejuice: “Sweetheart from Venezuela,” “Man Smart (Woman Smarter),” “Day-O,” and “Jump in the Line.”
