In the movie Heartburn, an unknown Kevin Spacey plays a punk who mugs Meryl Streep as she’s on her way to her group therapy session. It plays out rather hysterically.
In the Rick Moranis version of Little Shop of Horrors, two of the doo-wop backup singer girls are Tisha Campbell and Tichina Arnold, who would later come to popularity as the female lead, Gina, and her best friend Pam (respectively) on the sitcom Martin. Campbell is now the wife on Damon Wayans’s sitcom, My Wife and Kids.
In My Blue Heaven, Jesse Bradford, seen recently on The West Wing and in Swimfan plays one of Joan Cusack’s young sons.
Speaking of The West Wing, Richard Schiff, who plays Toby Ziegler, played a cop on a “very special” episode of Saved by the Bell. Years earlier, he was a cruel and mean-spirited dog pound employee in an episode of LA Law. He’s one of the few men who don’t look great in a uniform. Bradley Whitford, who plays Josh Lyman, was the sucky boyfriend who stood up Elisabeth Shue precipitating the events in Adventures in Babysitting. And John Spencer (Leo McGarry) was the senior officer in the missile silo in the prologue scenes of the movie War Games.
Laurence Fishburne also had a bit part in the thoroughly excerable Melanie Griffith vehicle Cherry 2000. I believe she consults him in a busy nightclub or something. Awful movie, but a treat to see Mr. Fishburne.
And of course, Samuel L. Jackson as the robber who tries to hold up McDowell’s burger joint in Coming to America.
Right…I just thought they were already pretty well-known at that point. An IMDb search reveals that neither had been in anything very high-profile before Tap, so I guess I was wrong.
Laurence Fishburn also played Cowboy Curtis on “Pee-Wee’s Playhouse”.
When HG Wells ends up at the museum after traveling through time in the begining of “Time After Time”, there’s a little boy wanting to let his mother know about the strange man in the display. The little boy is Corey Feldman.
She had a very small part in Saturday Night Fever as a woman at the club gushing over Tony.
I may as well add this one - many people might not know that Sipowicz (Dennis Franz) was in a bunch of Brian DePalma’s early films - The Fury, Dressed To Kill, Blow Out, and Body Double.
I watched The Fury recently (man, that movie’s terrible), and there’s a scene where Kirk Douglas holds up two cops and uses them to make his getaway. I didn’t recognize Dennis Franz at all as one of the cops…until he started talking.
Oh, and speaking of The Fury, there’s a scene where Amy Irving is at school and some of the girls at the lunch table are making fun of her. One of them is an extremely young Darryl Hannah and the other is an extremely young Dr. Weaver from E.R.. Also, Dr. Weaver was Lowell’s wife Bunny from Wings.
Susanne Somers was in Magnum Force - in the scene where the guy sneaks up on the Tiburron pool party and machine guns everyone, she can be seen walking around topless, and again getting shot moments later.
I could go on in this thread forever. I think instead I’ll just bow out.
I’ll say. As Larry, he was one of the thugs in Deathwish 2.
In My Stepmother is an Alien, a very young Alyson Hannigan stars as Dan Aykroyd’s daughter. At the end of the movie she goes on a date. With a very young Seth Green. Julliet Lewis is in there, too.
Speaking of Damon Wayans, he is in Beverly Hills Cop. Briefly. He’s the gentleman that gives Eddie Murphy the banana to put in the tailpipe of the cop car.
