Call it equal opportunity laughter, but Louie Anderson did not appear in 1988’s “Coming to America” because stars Eddie Murphy and Arsenio Hall were eager to share the screen with him.
When they appeared together on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” to promote the sequel, “Coming 2 America,” they revealed the real reason.
“I love Louie, but I think we were forced to put Louie in it,” Hall, 65, told the host. “We were forced to use a white person.”
Murphy, 59, agreed: “[The studio was] like, “There must be a white person in the movie.” I was like, ‘What?’ So who was the funniest white guy around? We knew Louie was cool, so that’s how Louie got into the movie. “
In case there is any doubt as to the veracity of this story, Hall referred to the evidence. “It was official,” Hall continued. ‘I had a list. They gave me a list of three white guys. They said, “Who would you rather work with?” I said Louie. “
Be that as it may, Anderson, who scored an Emmy for his performance in the FX comedy “Baskets,” must have done something right: he made it to the sequel. He actualises his role as Maurice, a goofball fast food employee at the McDowell’s with golden arches.
Hall’s list aside, Anderson has maintained that he did a little something to lubricate the casters wheels. In the late 1980s, at a dinner at the Ivy – a Beverly Hills hotspot for celebs – Anderson saw Murphy and his entourage. He told the waiter to put Murphy’s and the company’s bill on his credit card. However, as Anderson told the “Sway in the Morning” satellite radio crew in 2017, he instructed the waiter, “Don’t tell him until after I’m gone. I’m not doing it to be a big player. I’m doing it because I’m from the Midwest and that’s how we would do it [it]
The next morning, Anderson received a call from Murphy. He not only thanked for the gesture – “Nobody ever bought me anything,” Murphy told Anderson – but also said he wanted to cast Anderson in “a movie called ‘Coming to America.'”
Anderson marveled at comic karma and said, “That’s life, isn’t it? It was the best $ 660 I’ve ever spent. “