“Coming 2 America” (2021) Desperately Needed a Workable Script (Part I of II)
(3.5/10)
“Coming 2 America” (2021), a sequel to the 1988 classic “Coming to America” exclusively broadcast on Amazon Prime, is so stunningly inept that one wonders how it ever got beyond the story concept phase.
The film picks up 30 years after the original. Prince Akeem Joffer (Eddie Murphy) is now the King of Zamunda, and he and his wife Queen Lisa Joffer (Shari Headley), the American whom he fell in love with during the first film, have three daughters together, including the eldest Meeka (KiKi Layne). Zamundan law doesn’t allow the ruler to be female–just like in all other fairytale kingdoms concocted in Hollywood–so Meeka is not eligible to take over the throne.
As his father (James Earl Jones) is dying, Akeem learns that, unbeknownst to him, he had a son with Mary Junson (Leslie Jones), who drugged and had sex with him when he was in New York 30 years ago. After a rather offensive remembrance of this moment, he travels back to America with Semmi (Arsenio Hall), Akeem’s best friend and aide, to find the “bastard son” so he can bring him back to Zamunda.
Akeem’s son is Lavelle Junson (Jermaine Fowler), who mostly makes money by scalping tickets for his uncle, Reem Junson (Tracy Morgan). After a non-dramatic, non-humorous father-son intro, and without so much as a DNA test, Akeem convinces Lavelle and Mary to come to Zumanda to become the heir to the throne.
Once in Zumanda, Lavelle gets the royal treatment, struggles at learning to be a prince and tries to pass the princely test. One of the persons giving him the royal treatment and encouragement is Mirembe (Nomzamo Mbatha), the royal groomer. Thirty seconds into her first appearance on screen, it’s pretty clear that she will become Lavelle’s love interest because she is not a royal.
If this storyline seems awfully familiar, it’s because this movie is the black cast version of “Princess Diaries” (2001)–in which Anne Hathaway struggles to become Princess Mia of Kingdom of Genovia–as well as its sequel “Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement” (2004)–in which Princess Mia falls in love with the wrong man. Despite this ripoff, it took three people (Barry W. Blaunstein, David Sheffield and Justin Kanew) to come up with “Coming 2 America”‘s story and a separate committee of three (composed of Kenya Barris, Balunstein and Sheffield) to turn the story into a screenplay.
(Continued to Part II)
