Two months into 2019, and the cinematic year has already provided several great surprise cameos and extended appearances. SPOILERS AHEAD:
Bruce Willis appeared briefly at the end of 2017’s “Split”. M. Night Shyamalan intentionally connected Willis’s “Unbreakable” character David Dunn to the saga of James McAvoy’s Kevin Wendell Crumb – setting this up for “Glass”. Willis also made a cameo in an early 2019 release. In “The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part”, he voices himself in one of the true laugh-out-loud funny moments of an otherwise disappointing animated follow-up.
It was spoiled in a trailer released six months ago, but “Shark Tank”’s Mark Cuban and Shaq appear in rom-com “What Men Want” during a poker game scene with star Taraji P. Henson. Cuban’s game for anything and recently called Henson’s performance “phenomenal”.
The best scene in “The Upside” features Bryan Cranston, Kevin Hart and “ER” and “The Good Wife”’s Julianna Marguiles having lunch. It’s raw, unpredictable, poignant and quite memorable.
“Fighting with My Family” is the dramedy/biopic of WWE wrestler, Paige. Dwayne Johnson plays himself in a few scenes, but he’s also joined by Big Show and Sheamus as themselves.
Director Robert Rodriguez enlisted a big-time A-lister for a single shot cameo at the end of his sci-fi “Alita: Battle Angel”. It’s Edward Norton who plays Nova, the leader of Zalem who will face-off against Alita in a sequel (if it ends-up getting made).
If you didn’t see the trailers or know much of the story going into DreamWorks’ “How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World”, then you would’ve been surprised to see Gerard Butler’s Stoick (in flashbacks). Director Dean DeBlois told me that Butler knew while making 2014’s “Dragon 2” that he was coming back… in some way, shape or form… for “Dragon 3”.
And then… there’s Mike Tyson. He made one of the most iconic cameos in modern film history in 2009’s “The Hangover”. But that kind of status didn’t stop Tyler Perry from getting him for a final scene appearance in “A Madea Family Funeral”. And it’s, without question, the highlight of the movie.
A film that could’ve really used a cameo: “Isn’t It Romantic”. The Rebel Wilson comedy checks off most of the boxes when it comes to satirizing the romantic comedy film genre – except getting a rom-com staple, like Julia Roberts or Drew Barrymore, to poke fun at it.