Eddie Murphy wanted Tracy Morgan to play his son in Coming 2 America until he realized they look the same age and changed his role to the uncle. The PG-13 sequel gets a streaming release on Amazon Prime on March 5. Murphy's long-awaited follow-up to the 1988 classic, Coming to America, sees him reprising not only the role of Prince Akeem of Zamunda, but also a number of his other roles from the original, including Mr. Clarence, Randy Watson, and Saul.
Arsenio Hall also reprises his many roles, including Semmi, Reverend Brown, and Morris, while Jermaine Fowler (Lavelle), Leslie Jones (Mary), Morgan (Reem), and Wesley Snipes (General Izzi) join the cast for Coming 2 America. Morgan's role is that of Lavelle's uncle, one that he jumped at the chance to portray, given his special connection to the original film, which helped to cheer him up after the passing of his father in 1987. But Morgan, who is best known for his stint on SNL and for playing a fictionalized version of himself called Tracy Jordan in 30 Rock, could have ended up playing Fowler's role, at least according to a new interview.
Speaking to Cinemablend, Murphy says that for a long time, Morgan was going to play Levelle. However, he says he and the producers realized it wouldn't work after they'd met with Morgan a few times, saw that he looks the same age as Murphy, and decided it would be tough to make the casting "believable." He says the decision was then taken to cast someone else, and Morgan was given the role of Lavelle's uncle, Reem, instead, making his role more age-appropriate. You can read Murphy's comments below:
In the original idea, Tracy Morgan was gonna be my son. Three years into writing it, Tracy was the son, still. What changed was, we met with Tracy a couple times and it was like "Tracy looks the same age as me. How are we going to make this believable. How are we gonna make this be right? Tracy can't be Leslie's [Jones] son. So how are we gonna do this? Then it turned into, "hey, how about Tracy is the uncle?"
It's interesting that Morgan was considered for the role at any point. At 52, Morgan is only seven years younger than 59-year-old Murphy, and just one year younger than 53-year-old Jones. Fowler, who is just 32, is far more appropriate for the role. Thankfully, sanity prevailed in the end, as Morgan would have looked very odd trying to play a man in his late 20s or early 30s, especially given Murphy and Jones both arguably look younger than Morgan, who has struggled with health problems in the past decade.
Still, from a purely comical standpoint, Morgan would have been great in the role. His style of humor is perfect for Coming 2 America, and he would have been great as Murphy's son if their age gap was a little larger. Fortunately, Murphy managed to find Morgan a role anyway, and he'll be spending some time having fun in the fictional kingdom of Zamunda as Lavelle's uncle instead.
Source: Cinemablend
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