Susan Sarandon is back in the spotlight thanks to Sabrina Carpenter.
The Oscar winner made a surprise cameo in Carpenter’s Coachella headliner on Friday, after claiming he was blacklisted by Hollywood for his pro-Palestinian views.
Carpenter, 26, made a splashy headlining debut, belting out hits like “Espresso” and “Please Please Please,” before turning the stage into her own sassy “Sabrina Wood,” styled like the iconic Hollywood sign.
But it was Sarandon’s unexpected appearance — playing an older version of the pop star in the theatrical version — that shocked fans along the way.
The “Thelma & Louise” star, 79, appeared in a nearly seven-minute interlude set like a nostalgic drive-in movie scene, sitting behind the wheel of a vintage car with blonde hair styled similar to Carpenter’s and dressed in chic white.
She was joined by Carpenter’s former “Girl Meets World” co-star Corey Fogelmanis, who played an exhausted waiter trying to get off work.
In this segment, Sarandon’s “older Sabrina” reflected on her younger days and memories, and described how her niece is looking through old photos and videos of her, but struggles to connect them to people she knows.
“Aunt Sabrina is happy, but she doesn’t smile,” says Sarandon’s “older Sabrina.”
The cameo comes after Sarandon revealed that she felt pushed out of Hollywood following backlash for her comments at a pro-Palestinian rally in the wake of the Hamas terrorist attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.
At an event in New York City’s Union Square on November 17, 2023, she said that Jewish Americans are “getting a taste of what it feels like to be Muslim in America,” a statement she later apologized for, calling it a “terrible mistake.”
Sarandon also participated in an anti-Israel protest at Columbia University in April 2024, where she was seen wearing a leather coat jacket with a portrait of Bart Simpson on the red leather sleeve.
In a November 2024 interview with the London Times, Sarandon said she was fired by her agency and lost projects, adding that she felt she had been made an “example of what not to do” in the industry.
Her Coachella appearance was a rare high-profile moment in the aftermath, but it wasn’t the only celebrity cameo packed into Carpenter’s ambitious set.
Will Ferrell appeared on stage as an electrician dragging power cables, and Samuel L. Jackson said, “Hello, Coachella…we’re here to take moms on a journey to relaxation.”
The show also opened with a cinematic black-and-white intro starring Sam Elliott as a mysterious police officer who warns Carpenter not to go to California.
“You know that’s not right. It’s wrong,” he says in the clip.
Still, one unscripted moment threatened to momentarily steal attention from the star-studded spectacle.
At one point, Carpenter heard an unusual noise from the crowd and stopped.
“I think I heard someone yodeling,” she said, looking out over the audience, and asked, “Is that what you’re doing?”
When a fan confirmed it, Carpenter bluntly replied, “I don’t like it.”
A concertgoer tried to explain that it was “part of their culture,” to which Carpenter responded, “That’s your culture, yodeling?”
“Is this Burning Man?” the singer joked. “What’s going on? This is weird,” she added, before quickly moving on and continuing the show.
