Getty Klay Thompson takes the court in Game 6 of the 2019 NBA Finals.
Klay Thompson has been a postseason hero for the Golden State Warriors, and now the five-time NBA All-Star is making his debut as a basketball villain.
This weekend, Warner Brothers released the new trailer for “Space Jam: A New Legacy,” the LeBron James project that features several basketball stars as members of the competing Goon Squad. That includes a very nearly unrecognizable Thompson, who made a brief cameo in the trailer as an animated bad guy.
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Thompson Takes on Different Looks
As NBC Sports Bay Area noted, there appeared to be two different looks for Thompson in the film. In one of the images, he appeared to be a blue and icy version of himself. The other version of Thompson looked like a representation of the player who has shown up many times before in the postseason for the Warriors. His body transformed into literal flames, surrounded by a raging inferno as he clutched the ball.
As NBC Sports Bay Area noted, Thompson is joined by Warriors teammate Draymond Green on the “Goon Squad,” who take on James in the movie. They are joined by Diana Taurasi, Anthony Davis, and Damian Lillard.
Thompson Snagged a Coveted Role
As James told Entertainment Weekly in an interview published last month, there was a lot of interest among fellow players looking to appear in the movie. In the original “Space Jam,” Michael Jordan led the Looney Tunes in a game against monster versions of Charles Barkley, Shawn Bradley, Patrick Ewing, Larry Johnson and Muggsy Bogues. There were plenty of players looking to play the opposing team in the revisited version, James said.
“The phone would ring, the texts would come in, and then on social media a lot of people were tweeting at me saying, ‘Hey, I’m available for Space Jam if you need me. LOL. Asking for a friend.’ A lot of people my age or even younger just remember the classic. They remember Space Jam the original, and people want to be a part of it, because it’s something that lasts forever, something that’s timeless, and something that you can tell your kids and grandkids about.
Had James made the project when it was first pitched to him, Thompson would have never been able to appear. He told Entertainment Weekly that it was first brought to him 15 years ago, but James felt that he wasn’t ready to appear in something of that magnitude so early into his career. He was still two years away from his first NBA Finals appearance at that point and seven years before he would win his first title. Since then he has also launched a movie career, including a well-received role in the comedy “Trainwreck.”
Thompson was lucky enough to get the call once James finally did make the project, and even overcame some setbacks to make his appearance. Back in 2019, he was spotted making an appearance on the “Space Jam 2” set in crutches, just days after he had suffered a torn ACL in Game 6 of the NBA Finals. Video shared by TMZ Sports showed Thompson greeting James and hobbling around on set.
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