--- title: Winona Ryder Was Called a Witch By Bullies After Beetlejuice description: Winona Ryder revealed that she was bullied and called a "witch" after she appeared in the cult classic 'Beetlejuice.' canonical: https://time.com/4972225/winona-ryder-bullied-after-beetlejuice/ author: Cady Lang article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-10-06T15:59:57.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:47:50.680Z og:title: Bullies Called Winona Ryder a Witch After 'Beetlejuice' og:description: Lydia Deetz was not a hit at school og:url: https://time.com/4972225/winona-ryder-bullied-after-beetlejuice/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8f8acd3871562b7c/6988e0d8bc6cfc33143e3687/winona-ryder-bullied-beetlejuice.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2000 og:image:height: 1125 og:image:alt: 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards - Press Room og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Bullies Called Winona Ryder a Witch After 'Beetlejuice' twitter:description: Lydia Deetz was not a hit at school twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8f8acd3871562b7c/6988e0d8bc6cfc33143e3687/winona-ryder-bullied-beetlejuice.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Winona Ryder Shares How She Was Bullied in School After _Beetlejuice_ > Sponsored content. 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Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically.  by [Cady Lang](https://time.com/author/cady-lang/)  ## Cady Lang Oct 6, 2017 3:59 PM UTC  LOS ANGELES, CA - JANUARY 29: Winona Ryder poses in the press room with her award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series for 'Stranger Things' at the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Expo Hall on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Dan MacMedan/WireImage) LOS ANGELES, CA - JANUARY 29: Winona Ryder poses in the press room with her award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series for 'Stranger Things' at the 23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards at The Shrine Expo Hall on January 29, 2017 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Dan MacMedan/WireImage) Dan MacMedan—WireImage  by [Cady Lang](https://time.com/author/cady-lang/)  ## Cady Lang Oct 6, 2017 3:59 PM UTC Lydia Deetz has been the quirky goth hero of many since she first appeared in the ’80s cult classic film [_Beetlejuice_](http://time.com/4428264/winona-ryder-tim-burton-michael-keaton-beetlejuice/)_,_ but it turns out that the role haunted real-life counterpart [Winona Ryder](http://time.com/4380827/winona-ryder-stranger-things-johnny-depp/). The beloved [_Stranger Things_](http://time.com/4867795/stranger-things-season-2-trailer-comic-con/) star shared with [_Marie Claire U.K._](http://www.marieclaire.co.uk/entertainment/people/winona-ryder-marie-claire-541676)that she was bullied by her peers despite the overwhelming popularity of the film; in fact, the movie gave them another way to tease her by calling her a “witch.” “I remember thinking, ‘Ooh, it’s, like, the number-one movie. This is going to make things great at school,'” Ryder said. “But it made things worse. They called me a witch.” Ryder didn’t let the haters get to her, however; in the time since, she’s had plenty of other truly memorable roles since then and even nabbed a Golden Globe Award in 1994 for for her role in _The Age of Innocence_. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4972225/winona-ryder-bullied-after-beetlejuice/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4972225/winona-ryder-bullied-after-beetlejuice/"},"headline":"Winona Ryder Shares How She Was Bullied in School After Beetlejuice","datePublished":"2017-10-06T15:59:57.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:47:50.680Z","description":"Lydia Deetz was not a hit at school","url":"https://time.com/4972225/winona-ryder-bullied-after-beetlejuice/","keywords":["Newsfeed","celebrities","viral","entertainment","Stranger Things"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8f8acd3871562b7c/6988e0d8bc6cfc33143e3687/winona-ryder-bullied-beetlejuice.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Cady Lang","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/cady-lang/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8f8acd3871562b7c/6988e0d8bc6cfc33143e3687/winona-ryder-bullied-beetlejuice.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards - Press Room","caption":"23rd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards - Press Room","creditText":"Dan MacMedan—WireImage","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4972225/winona-ryder-bullied-after-beetlejuice/","name":"Winona Ryder Shares How She Was Bullied in School After Beetlejuice"}}]}] ```