Basketball Great Bill Walton Has A 'Cameo' In Ghostbusters. Really.
NBA Hall of Fame center Bill Walton is hard to miss. Standing nearly seven feet tall with a robust head of white (formerly red) hair and beaming smile, Walton has enjoyed a long career as an NBA and college basketball broadcaster since stepping off the court for good in 1987. He also has 20 acting credits to his name on IMDb, almost all as his very recognizable self. But although his so-called "acting debut" came in a popular movie classic, it is the epitome of blink-and-you'll-miss-it.
During an ESPN broadcast, Walton revealed to his courtside broadcast partner Dave Pasch that he had made an appearance in the hit 1984 comedy "Ghostbusters." The incredulous Pasch asked Walton if he was the ghost that slimed Bill Murray's character, Dr. Peter Venkman, a question which Walton responded to by telling Pasch, "just check out the movie." When Pasch replied that he had seen the film "more than 100 times," (via The Score), Walton responded that he must not have watched "all the way to the end."
Walton appears for just a couple of blurry frames during the end credits of Ghostbusters
It took an unnamed Reddit user with a quick pause finger and excellent vision — who four years ago posted a note to r/CollegeBasketball — to pick out Walton's face in the crowd celebrating the Ghostbusters team's vanquishing of the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man as the movie's credits begin to roll. While Venkman, Dana Barrett (Sigourney Weaver), Egon Spengler (Harold Ramis), and Winston Zeddemore (Ernie Hudson) — all still covered in bits of marshmallow — celebrate with the crowd and Dr. Ray Stantz (Dan Aykroyd) enjoys a cigar, the camera pans quickly across the cheering crowd.
As a news cameraman films Stantz driving the team's iconic ambulance out of the crowd, a tall man with curly red hair can be seen briefly in the background. That indeed is Walton. And while the Oregon-Washington game went on, preventing Pasch from questioning Walton as to exactly how he ended up in the celebrating throng at the end of "Ghostbusters," knowing he is in that crowd will prevent many basketball fans from watching the end credits (available on YouTube) ever again without pausing and rewinding repeatedly in hopes of catching the former UCLA Bruin and Boston Celtic's very brief appearance.