Welcome To The Jam: Don Cheadle Joins 'Space Jam 2' Cast
Don Cheadle (Avengers: Endgame) knows it's time to slam now, and there's a real jam going down over at Warner Bros. in the form of Space Jam 2, a sequel to the awful-yet-somehow-beloved live-action/animation hybrid from the 1990s which featured basketball legend Michael Jordan teaming up with the Looney Tunes. Current NBA superstar LeBron James has been trying to get a sequel off the ground for years, and he's actually managed to make it happen – and now Cheadle is the latest addition to the cast.
To quote the immortal lyrics of the first movie's theme song: Hey you, whatcha gonna do? If the "you" in question is Avengers and Ocean's Eleven actor Don Cheadle, the answer is, "Join the cast of Space Jam 2." Deadline reports that Cheadle is on board, though his role is being kept under wraps.
That secrecy means the possibilities for his character are practically endless. He could be playing an exaggerated version of himself. He could be voicing a creature similar to Mr. Swackhammer, the scheming alien voiced by Danny DeVito in the original movie. Cheadle could be a new MonStar, the basketball-playing aliens who stole the talent from NBA players in the first film. Or, my personal favorite theory, he could be reprising his role as explosives expert Basher Tarr from the Ocean's trilogy, complete with Basher's notoriously ludicrous English accent. Hey, we never thought Space Jam 2 would actually happen, but now that it is, nothing is outside the realm of possibility as far as I'm concerned. Bring on the Ocean's/Space Jam Cinematic Universe!
This wouldn't be the first time Cheadle steps onto a basketball court in a movie: he starred in a made-for-HBO movie called Rebound: The Legend of Earl "The Goat" Manigault back in 1996:
Ryan Coogler (Black Panther) is producing this sequel, which was once going to be directed by Justin Lin but is now being helmed by Terence Nance (Random Acts of Flyness). The plot is still largely under wraps – all we really know is it'll be about "Bugs Bunny and the Looney Tunes joining forces with James on the court to take on an unknown entity," so there's no word yet if the plot will retain the same basic structure as the original film or if this sequel will attempt to expand the story in a new direction. (The first one was literally about the idea of making Michael Jordan a slave on an alien planet, so...maybe something different this time?)Star Trek: Discovery actress Sonequa Martin-Green is playing LeBron James's wife in the film, and players from the NBA and WNBA like Klay Thompson, Diana Taurasi, Nneka Ogwumike, Anthony Davis, Damian Lillard, and Chiney Ogwumike are set to appear.Space Jam 2 dunks its way into theaters on July 16, 2021.