Coming to America (TV pilot)

Coming to America
Before Coming 2 America, there was this lackluster follow-up.
Genre: Sitcom Running Time: 24 minutes Country: United States Release Date: July 4, 1989 Network(s): CBS Created by: Ken Wecht Eddie Murphy Distributed by: Eddie Murphy Productions Paramount Network Television Starring: Tommy Davidson Paul Bates John Hancock Hattie Winston Paris Vaughan A.J. Johnson C. Darnell Rose Francis MacGuire

Coming to America is a television pilot for a proposed sitcom produced by Eddie Murphy Productions and Paramount, intended as a sequel to the 1988 Eddie Murphy film of the same name. It aired on CBS on July 4, 1989 as part of the CBS Summer Playhouse pilot anthology series. However, the show never made it past the pilot.

Plot

The pilot focuses on Tariq (Tommy Davidson), the younger brother of Akeem (Eddie Murphy) who's been exiled from Zamunda to attend college in Queens, New York along with his assistant Oha (Paul Bates). However, Tariq blows his allowance in 9 days, and so he and Oha must find a job at a diner owned by their landlord, Carl Mackey (John Hancock).

Why It's Not Coming to America

1. The pilot lacks the charm and satirical comedy of the original movie, and feels more like a knock-off of Family Matters and Perfect Strangers without doing anything unique to differentiate from those shows.
   • Reportedly, Ken Wecht, the showrunner and writer of the pilot who worked on various African-American shows like Diff'rent Strokes and Webster, refused to take suggestions from the production team and instead wrote the pilot to be more like the other shows that he worked on.
2. Oha is portrayed completely differently from the original movie, having a more over-the-top personality instead of being the straight man, a role now relegated to their landlord, Carl Mackey.
3. Outside of an establishing shot during the opening credits, the kingdom of Zamunda doesn't appear and is barely mentioned.
4. Despite being played by stand-up comedian Tommy Davidson, his character Tariq is a poor imitation of Eddie Murphy's Akeem mixed with Davidson's own comedy styles, which doesn't really work well.
5. On the topic of comedy, it falls pretty flat, mostly relying on 1980s references, including Stevie Wonder, Michael Jackson and Eddie Murphy's other movies, such as Beverly Hills Cop and Trading Places. Jokes that don't involve '80s pop culture are disgusting and/or racist, like the stereotypical joke about Africans eating insects.

Reception

The Coming to America pilot was critically panned, with Joan Hanauer from UPI stating that the pilot "was perfectly awful" and "If your idea of humor is seeing a fat man's pants split in back when he bends over, then you will find Coming to America screamingly funny."

Molly Fitzpatrick of Splinter News said "Tommy Davidson's Tariq lacks Eddie Murphy's Akeem's irresistible Pollyannaish charm from the film, and the pilot mostly functions as a disjointed vehicle for Davidson's Stevie Wonder and Michael Jackson impressions."

Bonsu Thompson wrote an oral history of the pilot, saying that the pilot floundered because it was written by a Jewish writer, Ken Hecht, “who had made a name penning Black sitcoms like Diff'rent Strokes and Webster and reportedly took a rigid, I-know-best approach to comedy". Thompson also stated the pilot “didn't take advantage of Tommy Davidson's gifts." and "what Hecht was able to do with family sitcoms like Diff'rent Strokes and Webster did not rule in 1989--and a suspect fascination with Africans eating insects didn't help."

Tommy Davidson, who played Tariq, said that Ken Hecht "came from the golden age of comedy, where he knew about the setup, joke, joke, and another joke but didn't have a feel for Eddie Murphy's style of comedy nor a feel for Black pride." He also stated that despite being listed as an executive producer, Eddie Murphy never actually visited the set where the pilot was filmed.

Trivia

• Before Tommy Davidson was cast as Tariq, Marlon Wayans, Will Smith and Wesley Snipes were considered for the lead role.

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