Coming to America
Coming to America is a 1988 American romantic comedy film directed by John Landis, based on a story originally created by Eddie Murphy, written by David Sheffield and Barry W. Blaustein, and starring Murphy, Arsenio Hall, James Earl Jones, John Amos, Madge Sinclair, and Shari Headley. It tells the story of Akeem Joffer, the crown prince of the fictional African nation of Zamunda who travels to the United States in the hopes of finding a woman he can marry and will love him for who he is, not for his status or for having been trained to please him. The film was released in the United States on June 29, 1988, and received generally positive reviews from critics. It was also a box-office success, grossing an estimated $288.8–$350 million on a $36 million budget.
In 1989, a pilot for a planned spin-off television series was made, although this was never picked up for a series. A sequel to the film—Coming 2 America—was released on March 4, 2021.
Plot
In the wealthy African nation of Zamunda, crown prince Akeem Joffer grows weary of his pampered lifestyle on his 21st birthday and wishes to do more for himself. When his parents King Jaffe and Queen Aoleon present him with an arranged bride-to-be, Akeem takes action. Seeking an independent woman who loves him for himself and not his social status, Akeem and his best friend/personal aide Semmi travel to the New York City borough of Queens and rent a squalid tenement in the neighborhood of Jackson Heights under the guise of poor foreign students.Beginning their search for Akeem's bride, they are invited by local barber shop owner Clarence to a rally raising money for the neighborhood. During the rally, Akeem encounters Lisa McDowell who possesses all the qualities he is looking for in a woman. Upon his insistence, he and Semmi get entry-level jobs working at the local fast-food restaurant called McDowell's, a McDonald's knockoff owned by Lisa's widowed father Cleo McDowell.
Akeem's attempts to win Lisa's love are complicated by Lisa's lazy and obnoxious boyfriend Darryl Jenks whose father owns Soul Glo. After Darryl announces their engagement—without Lisa's consent—to their families, she starts dating Akeem who claims that he comes from a family of poor goat herders.
Although Akeem thrives on hard work and learning how commoners live, Semmi is not comfortable with living in such meager conditions. After a dinner date with Lisa is thwarted when Semmi furnishes their apartment with a hot tub and other luxuries, Akeem confiscates his money and donates it to a homeless Mortimer and Randolph Duke. Semmi wires a telegraph to King Jaffe for more money, prompting the Joffers to travel to Queens to find him.
Cleo initially disapproves of Akeem as he believes he is poor and therefore not good enough for his daughter. He becomes ecstatic when he discovers that Akeem is actually an extremely wealthy prince, after meeting his parents. When Akeem discovers that his parents have arrived in New York, he and Lisa go to the McDowell residence in Jamaica Estates to lie low and Cleo welcomes them while driving away Darryl. After Cleo's bond with Akeem is ruined by the unexpected arrival of the Zamundan entourage, Lisa later becomes angry and confused that Akeem lied to her about his identity. Akeem explains that he wanted her to love him for who, not what, he is, even offering to renounce his throne. Still hurt and angry, Lisa refuses to marry him. Despondent, Akeem resigns himself to the arranged marriage. As they leave, Aoleon reprimands Jaffe for clinging to outdated traditions instead of thinking of their son's happiness.
At the wedding procession, a still-heartbroken Akeem becomes surprised when his veiled bride is Lisa herself as Cleo also comes out. Following the ceremony, they ride happily in a carriage to the cheers of Zamundans. Witnessing such splendor, Lisa is both surprised and touched by the fact that Akeem would have given it up just for her. Akeem offers again to abdicate if she does not want this life, but Lisa playfully declines.
Cast
- Eddie Murphy as:
- * Prince Akeem Joffer, the Crown Prince of Zamunda.
- * Randy Watson, a soul singer with the fictional band Sexual Chocolate who perform at a rally that Akeem and Semmi attend.
- * Saul, a Jewish barbershop customer.
- * Clarence, the owner of the barber shop.
- Arsenio Hall as:
- * Semmi, Akeem's friend and personal aide.
- * Reverend Brown, a reverend who speaks at a rally that Akeem and Semmi attend.
- * Morris, a barber.
- * Extremely Ugly Girl, an unattractive female clubgoer.
- James Earl Jones as King Jaffe Joffer, Akeem's father and King of Zamunda, to whom Semmi answers.
- John Amos as Cleo McDowell, the proprietor of McDowell's, Akeem's employer, and Lisa's father; constantly dodging trademark-infringement claims by lawyers from McDonald's by arguing his restaurant is different in various insignificant ways.
- Madge Sinclair as Queen Aoleon Joffer, Akeem's mother and the Queen of Zamunda.
- Shari Headley as Lisa McDowell, Cleo's older daughter and Akeem's love interest.
- Clint Smith as Sweets, a barber who works for Clarence.
- Paul Bates as Oha, the Zamundi royal family's longtime royal servant.
- Eriq La Salle as Darryl Jenks, Lisa's boyfriend and the son of Soul Glo's owner whom she eventually breaks up with.
- Frankie Faison as the landlord who manages the apartment building where Akeem and Semmi live.
- Vanessa Bell as Imani Izzi, a woman who is betrothed as Akeem's intended wife.
- Louie Anderson as Maurice, a McDowell's employee. According to Hall, Paramount Pictures insisted on having a white actor in the cast. Paramount Pictures provided a list of three white performers. Murphy and Hall chose Louie Anderson because they knew him and liked him.
- Allison Dean as Patrice McDowell, Cleo's younger daughter and Lisa's sister.
- Sheila Johnson as a lady-in-waiting to King Joffer.
- Jake Steinfeld as a cab driver who takes Akeem and Semmi to Queens.
- Calvin Lockhart as Colonel Izzi, Imani's father
- Samuel L. Jackson as the Hold-Up Man, an armed robber at McDowell's who held it up five times.
Don Ameche and Ralph Bellamy reprise their roles as Mortimer and Randolph Duke respectively from Landis's Murphy-starring comedy film Trading Places who have become homeless after the events of the film and receive money from Akeem. A segment of the Trading Places score can be heard during their scene.
As previously indicated, Coming to America features Murphy and Hall in several different roles, of different races and genders. Following the success of this film, this became a Murphy staple, as seen in four later films: Vampire in Brooklyn ; The Nutty Professor and its sequel ; and Norbit.
Production
Coming to America reunited star Eddie Murphy with director John Landis. The two men had previously worked together on the comedy hit Trading Places. Landis recalled the differences in working with Murphy on the two movies: "The guy on Trading Places was young and full of energy and curious and funny and fresh and great. The guy on Coming to America was the pig of the world... But I still think he's wonderful in the movie." Murphy said:Despite the experience, Landis and Murphy collaborated again six years later on Beverly Hills Cop III.
South African chorus Ladysmith Black Mambazo sings Mbube during the opening sequence. The group has since recorded several different versions of Mbube; however, the version heard in Coming to America had not been released on its soundtrack or on CD as of 2006. A promotional song for the film, also titled "Coming to America", was written and performed by The System.
Murphy received a personal salary of $8 million for his work on the film, plus 15% of film rentals. Landis received $600,000, plus 10% of gross receipts. Landis's calling card appears as an "easter egg" within the film, on a science-fiction movie poster in the subway station after Lisa storms off the train.
Release
Paramount cancelled press screenings of the film after initial negative reactions to a press screening in New York City.Box office
Released on June 29, 1988, by Paramount Pictures in the United States, it was a commercial box-office success, both domestically and worldwide. The film debuted at number one with $21,404,420 from 2,064 screens, for a five-day total of $28,409,497. The film made $128,152,301 in the United States and ended up with a worldwide total of $288,752,301. It was the highest earning film that year for the studio and the third-highest-grossing film at the United States box office.It opened a month later in the UK and earned $7,712,622 during its seven-week run. It opened on September 2 in West Germany, where it debuted at number one with $3,715,791 from 297 screens. It ended its run after 13 weeks with $15,743,447. Several contemporary articles stated that the worldwide gross of the movie was $350 million.
Reception
Coming To America received positive reviews upon release.Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale.
Sheila Benson in the Los Angeles Times called it a "hollow and wearying Eddie Murphy fairy tale" and bemoans, "That an Eddie Murphy movie would come to this." Vincent Canby in The New York Times was also critical of the writing, calling it a "possibly funny idea" but suggesting the screenplay had escaped before it was ready. Canby viewed the film as essentially a romantic comedy but said the romantic elements fell flat, and the film instead goes for broad slapstick. Kathleen Carroll of the New York Daily News called the film "an adorably amusing upscale fairy tale, an endearingly romantic comedy which has all the fabulous fake opulence of an old-fashioned Hollywood musical as well as the traditionally sappy happy ending." Siskel & Ebert had mixed opinions on the film. Siskel enjoyed the acting from Murphy and Hall but Ebert was disappointed that Murphy did not bring his usual more lively performance, and Ebert was also critical of the unoriginal script. Siskel, in print, reviewed the film more enthusiastically, giving it three and a half stars out of four, and describing it as "a sweet, oft-told story", adding that "Murphy and Hall add a number of very sharp supporting roles hidden by makeup to add spice to the general level of gentleness." However, in 2016, in an interview for the Los Angeles Times, Eddie Murphy made a comment regarding the negative reviews of his work, saying: "Oh, they have no effect on me at all. I haven’t read a review in, easily, 20, 25 years. I used to. I remember when “Coming to America” came out, Siskel and Ebert gave it two thumbs way down, saying it sucked. Then 10, 15 years later, I remember seeing them do a retrospective and they were both, “The classic ‘Coming to America’ blah blah blah.’ The shelf life of movies changes over the years."