by David Christopher Bell
When an actor nails a certain role in his career it can be both a blessing and a curse. Anthony Perkins, for a no-brainer example, rarely picked up any roles after Psycho due to being typecast as the lunatic he so exquisitely played.
That’s why it’s also great to know when actors have a sense of humor about their more iconic roles – taking up the burden of spoofing themselves so no one else has to.
10. Lloyd Bochner Discovers What it Means “To Serve Man” in The Naked Gun 2 ½
Lloyd Bochner has a relatively small part as a villain in the second Naked Gun film, but that didn’t stop them from finding some way to fit in his famous line from The Twilight Zone’s “To Serve Man” episode. You know, the one where all the bigheaded aliens come down to eat us after promising us technological advancements. It’s the biggest dick move an alien race could ever pull.
Of course, anyone who has actually seen the episode will tell you that the actor never actually speaks the line, but whatever – it’s the only iconic role this guy’s got.
9. John Ritter Finds A Familiar Set in Stay Tuned
The concept of this film is that the devil is installing satellite dishes that suck people into TVs where, if they survive for 24 hours, their souls won’t go to hell. So basically it’s a world where Lucifer exists and smokes a shit load of marijuana.
Of course, since the film stars John Ritter they just had to get Three’s Company in there somewhere. But at least he didn’t get stuck in Three’s A Crowd instead.
8. Robert Patrick Is Looking For Someone in Wayne’s World
Robert Patrick, one suspects, gets addressed as T-1000 by fans more often than his real name. They sure as shit don’t call him Doggett, and “that guy from Die Hard 2” just doesn’t have a great ring to it either. No, he might be marked as this razor sharp character – but he isn’t complaining either.
At least he wasn’t when he showed up in Wayne’s World looking for John Connor.
7. Samuel L. Jackson Runs Into A Very Familiar Cop in The Incredibles
If it were up to me, this would be number one on the list. What I mean is, Die Hard With A Vengeance holds a very special place in my heart – as well as one particular scene where Zeus, Jackson’s character, has a run in with the worst city cop in the world – who pulls a gun on him for what can only be described as “yelling at a white person.”
You probably didn’t even notice it in The Incredibles, but his character Frozone finds himself in the exact same situation with a cop that looks quite familiar indeed. And like Die Hard, he calmly reaches over to the water at gunpoint. It’s actually quite amazing.
6. The Entire Cast Spoofs Themselves in Airplane!
Airplane is known as the film that took a bunch of serious old men and made then instant comedic legends without them ever having to lift a finger. Lloyd Bridges, Robert Stack, Peter Graves, and of course Leslie Nielsen had all – up until that point – often played the straight-faced hero. Along with that, Stack, Bridges, and Graves all had roles in previous airplane disaster movies or TV shows playing captains or air traffic controllers.
Airplane – while hilarious – is way better with context. For example the sweet women who speaks jive is funny, but much funnier when you realize who played her.
5. The Entire Pixar Cast Comes Back For Cars
This isn’t so much impressive as it is adorable. Sure, they got Tim Allen, Tom Hanks, Dave Foley, John Goodman, and Billy Crystal to all do cameos. That sounds noteworthy, but considering that they are all brief voice cameos- well heck, I could do that in a weekend with a tape recorder and a lock pick.
But again – it’s cute. The ending credits to Cars gave us all of the previous Pixar films, only in vehicle form. That said – considering the theory that all these films take place in the same universe, that leaves all sorts of disturbing questions to be answered.
4. Arnold Schwarzenegger Spoofs His Entire Career in The Last Action Hero
Technically there isn’t an actual moment where Schwarzenegger embodies a single role from his past so much as he is a collage of his entire career up until the point of this film. Then, as a final gift, we get to see him play an asshole version of himself meeting the fictional man whose life he made hell – it’s quite something.
The Last Action Hero did what The Expendables wishes it could do – be fully self-aware. The hard truth is that you simply need Shane Black for something like that. Can you imagine if Shane Black had written The Expendables?
Double points here for Robert Patrick, who once again reprised T-1000. Maybe he’s got a punch card or something.
Oh, and the amount of action stars doing meta work runs deep.
3. John Hurt Has The Space Special in Spaceballs
You know, it’s pretty rare to have a scene in a film where a space alien bursts through your ribcage once in an acting career. To have it happen twice is pretty fantastic. Also, what exactly were the odds that one of those occasions would involve the alien putting on a little song and dance ala Michigan J. Frog?
For John Hurt, however, the odds get better. After all – we’re talking about a man who has played both sides of a totalitarian Dystopia with Nineteen Eighty-Four and V For Vendetta. He’s played everything from space explorers to magic wand retailers. The man has range.
2. Danny Glover Isn’t Too Old for Maverick
You know what Mel Gibson should have done? For every film he did, he should have has a scene where Danny Glover came in and robbed all the characters and left. That would have been amazing!
Also he probably shouldn’t have said all those things about the Jews and black folk. But most of all, he should have had a scene where Danny Glover came in, robbed everyone, said he was “too old for this shit” and left.
Even Braveheart. ESPECIALLY Braveheart.
1. “I Loved You In Wall Street!” in Hot Shots! Part Deux
Only Martin Sheen’s son would be able to get him to reprise one of his most iconic roles in such a trashy spoof situation – twice, actually. Don’t get me wrong, I love Hot Shots – but it’s also too good for Martin Sheen. It’s totally good enough for Charlie Sheen, of course.
And yet, not only is he there, on a boat, in this film… but they also found the perfect goddamned line to give him for his 5 seconds of screen time. Emilio would have never asked him to do this.
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