…that was not based on the character’s TV show?
For example, Jason Lee briefly appears in Clerks II. While he doesn’t appear as his My Name is Earl character, it sure would have been cool if he did 
.
Nevertheless, has anything like this ever happened?
A bit of a stretch, but Miss Marple, who did appear in various TV movies, also shows up in The Alphabet Murders, which is not a Miss Marple movie (its main character was Poirot). However, the TV shows came after the movie.
I can think of a couple of examples where characters from older movies appeared in films playing the same character, even when the movie wasn’t a sequel: McGinty and Boss in Miracle of Morgan’s Creek, George M. Cohan in The Seven Little Foys, and the Duke Brothers in Coming to America.
Jay and Silent Bob from the Kevin Smith movies appeared in Scream 2 (or was it Scream 3) – not just the actors, but the actual characters.
In Back to the Beach (1987)
The final and better beach movie of Annette Funicello and Frankie Avalon, the Skipper and Gilligan (Hale and Denver) officially appeared as bartenders, but they were obviously the characters of Gilligan Isle.
Jack Benny Cameoed in character in It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World
Jim Nabors pretty much played Gomer in Cannonball Run II (1984) as Pvt. Homer Lyle
Jim
A better example: You reminded me that The Three Stooges got credit as “The Three Stooges” on the same movie.
Yep as the firemen at the airport, I did not realize they were credited as the Stooges. They had no lines.
Buddy Ebsen appeared as Barnaby Jones in the Beverly Hillbillies movie that starred Jim Varney as Jed Clampett. Ebsen of course, starred on TV as Uncle Jed, but Barnaby Jones was totally unrelated to the Beverly Hillbillies.
There’s a moment in another Kevin Smith movie that comes close.
(To Shannon Dougherty): “Brenda?!”
“Dick!”
I understand that the Bond movie The World is Not Enough features an “in-character” cameo by one of the guys from a BBC reality series “Clampers,” (about London traffic officers), but I’m not sure that counts.
James Doohan played a character named “Scotty” for a five-second cameo in Loaded Weapon 1.
Interestingly, it’s the only non-Trek movie that features both him and William Shatner.
Does it have to be a strictly fictional character?
Because in the forgettable Forget Paris, with Billy Crystal and Debra Winger, Rush Limbaugh comments on his TV show about a controversial call that NBA referee Billy crystal made.
And in Dave, Oliver Stone goes on TV to reveal to a not-very-caring nation that there is something screwy going on in the White House.
I’m not sure if this counts as “based on”, but many of the 'toons in Who Framed Roger Rabbit were TV characters. Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck come to mind, and I think all of the Loony Toons had at least cameos (I’m not counting the Disney characters, because I think they were more movie characters than TV).
Jacklyn Smith appeared as Kelly Garrett in the Charlies Angels Movies…
Barbra Eden appeared as Jeanie in the Very Brady sequel…
OOps, I guess Jacklyn Smith wouldn’t work as the character was based on the TV show.
Umm…Roger Rabbit takes place in 1947 when TV broadcasting was being resumed after World war II and was still not in everybody’s homes like it is today. Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck and the rest of the Looneys started out in theatrical cartoons shown before the featured movie. It wasn’t until the 60’s that they began showing Looney Tunes on TV. So they were all movie characters in Roger Rabbit’s frame of reference.
kaylasdad99 writes:
> Because in the forgettable Forget Paris, with Billy Crystal and Debra Winger,
> Rush Limbaugh comments on his TV show about a controversial call that NBA
> referee Billy crystal made.
If you want to count that, you should also count all the movies in which Larry King played himself interviewing a character in the movie.