One of the funniest parts of Deadpool 2 was the surprise big cameo when all of the X-Force botched their big sky-diving entrance. Among them was Vanishing Man, who, as the name would suggest, was never seen. That is until he got entangled in electrical wires and was fried to death.
The writers behind the funny gag took it even further and brought aboard a big celebrity cameo: none other than Brad Pitt himself. Audiences never expected to see an actor of that caliber appear in the movie for mere seconds.
Big celebrity cameos do seem to be a thing for Ryan Reynolds' movies. His recent blockbuster, Free Guy, even had Chris Evans pop up for a quick joke.
But when it comes to Pitt, how did that even come to be? Why did the actor agree in the first place? Well, during his press tour for Bullet Train, the actor revealed a simple reason for having said yes.
Brad Pitt's Surprisingly Simple Reasoning
In an interview with Ali Plumb for BBC Radio 1, Brad Pitt talked about his brief time on Deadpool 2 as the short-lived X-Force member the Vanisher.
Pitt noted that shooting for Deadpool 2 was basically the “easiest thing [he’s] ever done:”
“What was shooting that like? Pretty much, easiest thing I’ve ever done. Dave’s an old friend of mine and he used to be… he was my stunt double starting with Fight Club and all the way up till about 2004. And then he went off and became a really good director, which is rare. Rare.”
So why did the iconic actor join the Marvel movie in the first place? Well, simply put, “Ryan called and like, why not?"
Screenwriter Paul Wernick notes that in their original script, he and co-writers Rhett Reese and Reynolds didn’t conceive of that moment including a celebrity cameo.
In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter back around the release of Deadpool 2, the film’s writer, Paul Wernick, revealed that the writers thought the concept of the Vanisher would be the perfect outlet “for a celebrity cameo.”
“We never saw Vanisher in the original script. He was always a mystery… when he got tangled up…we just thought, ‘Oh my god, what a perfect idea for a celebrity cameo.’ And then we thought, ’Who is the hardest get in Hollywood? Let’s call him.’”
Thanks to Brad Pitt’s children loving the first Deadpool movie, when Ryan Reynolds reached out to see if the actor was up for the bit, “he immediately said yes.”
Director David Leitch admitted that “there was never a pressure… once [they] had the yes:”
“It was a super small window, but once we had the yes, there was never a pressure — we had a whole window of post to get it done,” says Leitch. “We shot the plates for it and really just needed to get him on a green screen for a short window of time.”
A 2018 interview with Entertainment Online had Ryan Reynolds talking about the invisible Vanisher cameo, with the actor admitting that Brad Pitt basically did it all for free, which was “the nicest thing anyone could do.”
“Sort of embellished… I was told all he wants is a cup of coffee and I said, ‘Like a franchise or just one individual cup of coffee?’ And I was told one individual cup of coffee, which was really his way of saying, ‘I’m doing it for nothing.’ And it was a total solid and the nicest thing anyone could do.”
What Cameos Could Be Waiting Ahead
With Reynolds having been able to score Brad Pitt, even if just for a second, one has to ask: what could he pull off when given all the tools of Marvel Studios? Deadpool 3 is just around the corner, so those conversations are likely taking place at this very moment.
There’s an endless amount the creatives behind the wheel could take advantage of—enough to make fans giddy when they start to think about it. But, will the upcoming third film still be in the Fox Universe, or will it take place entirely in the MCU?
A common thought process is that the Merc with the Mouth will start out still in the Fox Universe, and by the end of the movie, he’ll have moved onto Earth-616. Maybe they’ll try to adapt a version of Deadpool Kills the Marvel Universe.
Deadpool 3 is expected to hit theaters at some point in 2024 or 2025.
