Just hours after B-movie legend Bruce Campbell volunteered to play The Milk Man in Kevin Smith’s upcoming Mallrats sequel, Smith responded with an offer for Campbell to play himself in the movie. Shortly after news of the sequel was announced by Smith, Campbell took to Twitter to lobby for a part, asking Smith directly, “Can I play the Milk Man?” Once word got back to Smith that Campbell was interested, Smith hopped on his own Twitter account to offer this response:
“The role I have for you in Twilight of the Mallrats is the part you were *born* to play: [Bruce Campbell] himself! In a world where Brodie’s biggest hero [Stan Lee] is gone (but never forgotten), he’s gonna need all his *other* heroes. And Brodie loooooves Evil Dead 2 & Ash!”
This certainly seems like an ideal way to include Bruce Campbell in Twilight of the Mallrats. After all, the actor does have experience playing himself in the meta-horror movie My Name Is Bruce, which Campbell also directed. Written by Mark Verheiden, the movie follows Campbell playing a heightened version of himself: a B-movie star widely known for his starring role as Ash Williams in Sam Raimi’s Evil Dead movie franchise. In the movie, Bruce must channel his strongest characters after horror fans kidnap him and force the actor to save them from a real-life monster in a small Oregon town.
Smith is also known for bringing in celebrities to play themselves for special cameo appearances in many of his movies. His most recent picture, Jay and Silent Bob Reboot, was filled to the brim with celebrity cameos in addition to returning characters from previous Smith films. James Van Der Beek, Jason Biggs, Chris Hemsworth, Wes Craven, Ben Affleck, and Matt Damon are just a few famous faces to satirize themselves with cameos in Kevin Smith movies. It’s also worth noting the real-life Bruce Campbell is far more badass than any of his fictional characters, so featuring the Evil Dead star as himself in Mallrats 2 would definitely be amazing to see.
Following the success of Jay and Silent Bob Reboot, Smith grew even more interested in revisiting his other classic comedies. The filmmaker recently revealed a third Clerks movie is in the works, having finally convinced Jeff Anderson to come on board to reprise the fan favorite role of Randal Graves. Smith has since announced that a Mallrats sequel was in the works, dubbing the follow-up Twilight of the Mallrats. As was the case with Clerks 3, the reveal sparked a lot of excitement with filmgoers, and there’s already a lot of anticipation for both of these projects.
From 2015 to 2018, Campbell revisited the Evil Dead franchise by reprising the role of Ash Williams on the Starz television series Ash vs Evil Dead. The actor has since retired from playing Ash in any more movie or TV projects, but he didn’t say anything about never playing himself again. In any case, with both Smith and Campbell interested in bringing in the Evil Dead star for Twilight of the Mallrats, there’s a good chance we’ll actually see it happen. This news comes to us from Kevin Smith on Twitter.
