Film News
"Coming 2 America": How to Follow Up a Classic
Hollywood's love of reboots doesn't have to be depressing.
10.16.2020
Arsenio Hall and Eddie Murphy in costume behind the scens of "Coming 2 America"
Eddie Murphy's 1988 movie Coming to America is the latest classic movie to get a Hollywood revival decades later.
At this point it's a familiar formula. Rather than investing any money in the risk of an original concept, a film studio will dig up a beloved movie—long after anyone was expecting anything out of it—and run it through the reboot assembly line.
<p>Throw a half-dozen writers at cleaning up a rushed screenplay, give it an oversized budget for flashy effects and current stars, crank the hollow fan-service up to 11, and attach a director the studio knows they can push around. Et voila! You've disappointed nostalgic fans to the tune of $400 million at the box office.</p><p><!-- Ezoic - under_second_paragraph - under_second_paragraph -->
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<!-- End Ezoic - under_second_paragraph - under_second_paragraph --><p></p><p>Is this really a sustainable model? How many times can fans suffer through movies like <em>Men in Black: International</em> or <em>Jurassic World</em> before they stop investing their hopes and their hard-earned money in these reboots?</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-630"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - In-Content 2 - under_first_paragraph --></p><p>Fortunately, <em>Coming 2 America</em>—or <em>Coming to America 2</em>, depending who you ask—isn't following that mold. Rather than slapping a marketable brand on a cookie cutter piece of Hollywood pablum, the sequel that fans have waited more than 30 years to see brings back the actors and creators who made the original so great.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-youtube">
<span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="389a92f11af75cffbdc193137935de61"><iframe type="lazy-iframe" data-runner-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/-R1h2Df3Nrc?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span>
<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption...">Coming To America (All of the Barbershop Scenes) 1080p HD</small>
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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-R1h2Df3Nrc" target="_blank">www.youtube.com</a>
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</p><p>Much of the 1988 film's cast—including James Earl Jones, Arsenio Hall, Shari Headley, <a href="https://movieweb.com/coming-2-america-cast-louie-anderson/" target="_blank">Louie Anderson</a>, and John Amos—returned for the sequel. And, in addition to reprising his role as Prince Akeem Joffer of the fictional African nation of Zamunda (along with hopefully about a dozen other characters), Eddie Murphy collaborated with the original film's screenwriters, David Sheffeild and Barry W. Blaustein, with the addition of <em>Black-ish</em> creator Kenya Barris.<br></p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-632"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - In-Content 3 - under_second_paragraph --></p><p>While the original film's director, John Landis, was not involved in the sequel, the new director, Craig Brewer, proved himself last year when he helped to launch Eddie Murphy's comeback with <a href="https://www.popdust.com/eddie-murphy-dolemite-2641140473.html?share_id=5015718" target="_self">the hilarious and heartwarming <em>Dolemite Is My Name</em></a>.</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-633"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - In-Content 4 - mid_content --></p><p><em>Coming 2 America</em>, which <a href="https://variety.com/2020/film/news/eddie-murphys-coming-2-america-moves-from-paramount-to-amazon-studios-1234799523/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Amazon just picked up for digital distribution in a deal with Paramount</a>, follows Prince Akeem as he prepares to assume the throne and finds out that he has a son he didn't know about back in America. While the original film tells the love story of Prince Akeem traveling to New York City in search of love, it turns out he did in fact—as his father, King Jaffe, suggested—"sow his royal oats" and must return to the US to meet his son.</p><p>The new premise sounds like a solid follow-up to the original story, and the fact that so many of the key figures from the 1988 film have returned is promising, as is the addition of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4VGmzruPf8" target="_blank">comedian Jermaine Fowler</a> as Akeem's son, Lavelle, with Murphy's fellow SNL alums <a href="https://www.popdust.com/leslie-jones-time-machine-2644812876.html?share_id=5201581" target="_blank">Leslie Jones</a> and <a href="https://www.popdust.com/pt-the-last-og-review-2565815744.html" target="_blank">Tracy Morgan</a> playing Lavelle's mother and uncle, respectively.</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-634"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - In-Content 5 - mid_content --></p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNDUyMTg5My9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYyMzU3MTU5Mn0.iBxa9jO4pkNpJb-84x1zh_BAOZSvhrsiKQ9GU9xn22o/img.jpg?width=980" id="c7d83" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="edb959e080025430f1eb6c007042f3b6" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" alt="Leslie Jones and Tracy Morgan">
<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption...">Leslie Jones and Tracy Morgan filming "Coming 2 America"</small></p><p>Of course none of this is a guarantee that <em>Coming 2 America</em>—which is slated for a December 18th release on Amazon Prime—will live up to the high standard set by its predecessor, but at least it won't be another over-processed reboot that mistakes brand recognition and production value for the hard work and talent that actually makes a movie work.<br></p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-635"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent2 - long_content --></p><p>By contrast, the <em>Beverly Hills Cop</em> series—another classic from Eddie Murphy's past—has gone through a messy cycle of planned and scrapped reboots since the 1990s. With <em>Beverly Hills Cop IV</em> delayed, canceled, rewritten, reworked into <a href="https://www.nme.com/news/tv/eddie-murphy-s-beverly-hills-cop-tv-pilot-rejected-882308" target="_blank">a rejected TV pilot</a>, and handed off from one director to another in a depressing relay, fans are left uncertain about whether it will ever actually get made.<br></p><p></p><center><script async="" src="//pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js"></script><!-- Popdust Mobile Banner 320x100 --><ins class="adsbygoogle" style="display:inline-block;width:320px;height:100px" data-ad-client="ca-pub-4301469008561137" data-ad-slot="6952751205"></ins><script>
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</script></center><p></p><p><a href="https://movieweb.com/beverly-hills-cop-4-director-script-eddie-murphy/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">As of May, the film was once again being rewritten</a>, with production delayed by the pandemic lockdown. But if the directing team of Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah—who are currently attached to the project—take their cues from <em>Coming 2 America </em>and focus on preserving what people loved about the original franchise, maybe Eddie Murphy's triumphant return to the cinema will continue when Axel Foley finally arrives on Netflix.</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-636"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent22 - long_content --></p><h2></h2><p>In either case, as sad as it is that the film industry has such an aversion to original work, at least with projects like <em>Coming 2 America</em> there's hope that a faithful reboot can do a classic movie justice.</p>
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