What is your favorite cameo by a director in their own movie?

What Hitchcock did in Rope always gets my chuckle

Sydney Pollack in Tootsie. Way bigger than most cameos, I heard that Hoffman pressured him to play Michael Dorsey’s agent and he was really reluctant to play that part. But he’s perfect in the role and you can totally feel the frustration between them.

Sylvester Stallone in Staying Alive.

It was such an on the nose cameo when he and Travolta passed each other and just stared at each other.

Richard Linklater (School of Rock)

Taxi Driver comes to mind.

That is my pick for worst cameo by a director.

Paul Verhoeven cameo in RoboCop.

Todd Phillips in Road Trip.

Todd Phillips in Old School.

What do they look like Jimmy?

Dorks. They look like a couple dorks.

I’ll take that cameo over his appearance in Django Unchained.


I always loved seeing Richard Donner pop up in his movies. Particularly him rolling up on the beach in The Goonies.

Hitchcock was the first that came to mind.

Roman Polanski in Chinatown

You're a very nosy fellow, kitty cat. Huh? You know what happens to nosy fellows? Huh?

This! As soon as I saw the title of the thread, I opened it to mention Pollack. He was fantastic as Michael's agent. And yes, that was a borderline supporting role.

In the Laurel & Hardy service comedy, PACK UP YOUR TROUBLES (1932), the director George Marshall plays the role of the army chef who yells at the stars.

I was more amused by it because it was a blink and miss moment. Also, I did not expect to see him in it as just some random guy bumping into him on the street.

I love that Stallone cameo in Staying Alive, especially since the music of the Bee Gees goes into a little Rocky-like groove right when Travolta bumps into Stallone.

There's also a cool cameo of Clint Eastwood outside a church in American Sniper.

I don't know what my favorite director cameo is, I'll have to think about that.

My favorite cameo by a director in a movie they didn't direct is Steven Spielberg in The Blues Brothers.

My favorite Hitchcock cameo is in North by Northwest (4:10):

Cameo appearance by his ego

​​​How dare Stallone defile the artistic integrity of Staying Alive like that.

Don't look at the camera!

I know Hitchcock is known for his cameos and some of them are fine (I particularly like the one in Lifeboat) but man, some of those are way too obvious and pull you right out of the movie. Shit, there’s a couple where the camera actually pans over to him and then pans back.

For most of those cameos, if that was an extra doing the mugging, he would have been pulled out of the scene.

Surprise no one mentioned Peter Jackson on The Lord Of The Ring trilogy.