Pixar's Hoppers And Project Hail Mary Share A Voice Cameo

It turns out the two best blockbusters of March 2026, the wild Pixar comedy "Hoppers" and the stunning space adventure "Project Hail Mary," have something surprising in common: both productions convinced living legend Meryl Streep to record a few lines for a comedic cameo.

Streep's involvement with "Hoppers," in which she voices the monarch butterfly Insect Queen, was announced ahead of the movie's release, but the nature of her role was one of the film's most amusing shockers. As the royal who first proposes the idea of "squishing" Mayor Jerry (Jon Hamm), one might expect her to become the big antagonist of the film's second half — but then Mabel (Piper Curda) accidentally squishes the Queen, leaving the vengeance-seeking caterpillar Titus (Dave Franco) as the new Insect King. Casting the most Oscar-nominated actress ever as a character who's so quickly, unceremoniously killed only heightens the absurd joke.

In "Project Hail Mary," Streep's meta voice cameo comes in a montage of Dr. Ryland Grace (Ryan Gosling) testing out different voices for his computer translation of Rocky's alien language. Grace praises Streep for being able to do anything acting-wise, but continues to cycle through other options for Rocky's voice. The astronaut and the alien ultimately agree to a voice performed by James Ortiz (who happens to also be the puppeteer operating Rocky).

"Hoppers" director Daniel Chong told The Playlist that he envisioned the Insect Queen as a "Meryl Streep type" long before it came time to actually inquire about casting. The "Hoppers" team ended up on a Zoom call with Streep to explain the part, and she instantly vibed with the film's humor. 

"The minute I started pitching the story," Chong said, "she was just laughing the whole way through, and loved the tone. She understood the humor, and she understood what her role in the movie would be." As for how she reacted to finding out about her character's death, she reportedly responded, "I am ready for all that."

"Project Hail Mary" directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller were able to get Streep through their producer, Amy Pascal, who has worked with Streep several times before. Lord told Inquirer, "We were like, Amy, you've got to ask Meryl. It's a magical moment in the movie. And Meryl said yes and couldn't have been more playful and fun. She did so many different takes." Streep and the other alternate Rocky voices spoke their lines into a microphone connected to an earpiece worn by Ryan Gosling, who never knew who was going to speak next.

Meryl Streep's cameos in "Hoppers" and "Project Hail Mary" are her first performances in a wide release theatrical movie since she played Aunt March in Greta Gerwig's 2019 adaptation of "Little Women." Since then, she's narrated documentaries, appeared in a handful of streaming releases — "Let Them All Talk" on HBO Max, "The Prom" and "Don't Look Up" on Netflix — and been a regular guest on the Hulu series "Only Murders in the Building," but it's shocking to realize that these two joke cameos mark her official return to the big screen.

Streep's live-action return to movie theaters comes in a couple of months. In a rare break from her policy of trying to avoid sequels, she returns to her Golden Globe-winning role as fashion magazine editor Miranda Priestley in "The Devil Wears Prada 2," in theaters May 1. She's also attached to play Joni Mitchell in a biopic directed by Cameron Crowe.