Next week, one of the biggest movie comedies in a generation gets a long-delayed sequel, with a pair of Memphis hands at the helm.

Movies this week: Oscar favorite ‘Nomadland’ on the (really) big screen, ‘Coming 2 America’ teases

Craig Brewer was a junior in high school when he saw “Coming to America” in theaters. He was one of many who bought a ticket to Eddie Murphy’s story of an African prince traveling to America — to Queens, natch — to find a mate. The film grossed nearly $300 million — that’s 1988 money — at the worldwide box office. 

Now, 23 years later, Murphy’s Prince Akeem is back, and Memphis filmmaker Brewer is directing. “Box office” no longer applies, but the sequel — “Coming 2 America” — may be even more widely seen. Once projected to be a Christmas 2020 theatrical release, the film was sold by studio Paramount to Amazon, where it will debut on the Amazon Prime streaming service on Friday, March 5. 

It’s Brewer’s second go-round with Murphy after directing the comedy legend on 2019’s well-received Netflix feature “Dolemite Is My Name,” and the biggest project yet in a career that’s taken Brewer from no-budget indies (“The Poor and Hungry”) to Sundance success (“Hustle & Flow”) to Hollywood remakes (“Footloose”) to television both cult (“Terriers”) and commercial (“Empire”).

When Brewer first emerged as a Memphis artist more than 20 years ago, you could catch him honing scripts at Midtown haunts such as the Deliberate Literate coffee shop and The P&H Cafe dive bar. 

He likes being a regular, and he’s become one again, with an apartment and separate tucked-away, second-floor office/workspace at Crosstown Concourse. In between the walk from one to the other he’s found what he calls “my little community.”

“Coming 2 America” — in which a middle-aged Akeem learns of a son conceived during his earlier American sojourn —inverts the original. Where the first film was largely set in Queens but bookended by visits to the fictional African nation of Zamunda, this second film takes place primarily in Zamunda, now a post-Wakanda conception with contributions from Oscar-winning “Black Panther” costume designer Ruth E. Carter. (“Ruth was my first call,” said Brewer.)

That’s not the only difference. 

In 1988, viewers didn’t know what they were in for and the movie’s poster was all about Murphy. It was marketed as a star vehicle. But “Coming to America” created a universe of characters that quickly became beloved, and many — from the barbershop quartet of sorts to actor John Amos’ “McDowell’s” fast-food franchise to Randy Watson, lead singer of the band Sexual Chocolate — will be back. The sequel’s poster reflects this it-takes-a-village quality by featuring 21 figures, old and new, even if at least four of those are Murphy playing various characters.

“I would get stopped on the street and people would ask, ‘Is McDowell’s in it?’ It was excitement but it was a threat, right?” Brewer said. “But what I’m happy about is that there are even more surprises.”

“Coming to America” wasn’t quite the biggest box-office hit of Murphy’s classic ’80s run. That was “Beverly Hills Cop.” But it’s probably the one that has inspired the most enduring affection. 

“‘Coming to America’ is kind of a sweet movie,” Brewer says. “It’s existed on television in various clean versions forever, and so it occupies a very different place in the Eddie Murphy universe. Every other movie that he’d made, he can be vulgar, he can be wisecracking, he can be profane. That’s not the case with ‘Coming to America.’ It was a fairy tale and Eddie was very direct with me about not falling into the trap of people thinking ‘Coming 2 America’ had to be crude. That’s not what ‘Coming to America’ was. It was fun. Akeem was hopeful.”

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More from our conversation with Brewer on the eve of the “Coming 2 America” debut:

The Daily Memphian: With ‘Dolemite,’ you said that you were excited because of the people who were involved and its subject matter, but that you always needed to find a personal way into a project, even if it’s not your own script. What was that for “Coming 2 America”?

Craig Brewer: I would say that was even more directly applicable with “Coming 2 America” than my low-budget independent filmmaking background was to “Dolemite,” because I’m a dad. 

The themes that we’re exploring in “Coming 2 America” are really about Akeem being a father. 

I’m at an age where my father is no longer around and I have two teenage kids, and leaning more directly to the themes in “Coming 2 America,” I’ve got a 13-year-old daughter. As you know, you can’t help but see the world through a different lens when you have a daughter. And it’s a great plot device that Akeem has three daughters in a kingdom that still demands a male heir. 

That was my avenue in. That made me feel like not only did it have an opportunity to be funny, but to be poignant, because I think a lot of the people who are like me, who saw “Coming to America” the first time when they were a teenager, now have kids. 

Q: You’ve taken on pre-existing things in the culture before in different ways. “Footloose,” “Tarzan,” even “Dolemite.” But this is your first sequel, and “Coming to America” is beloved by a specific generation in maybe a more massive way than the others. How did those previous experiences inform how you approached this?

A: I would say it basically informed me in two ways. One is that there is this almost goalkeeper mentality in what you will allow past you that’s a nod or homage to the original source material.

Why do we want this person back or do we want to repeat this bit? We needed to check more boxes than just that it was in the original movie. Sometimes it can get gratuitous. I’m always keeping in mind that, God forbid, somebody hasn’t seen the first “Coming to America,” but I still want the movie to work. 

The second thing is really about my head and my heart and then helping the cast and production team with their head and heart. I think you can really be emotionally and mentally crushed under expectations of a follow-up to something people love, or a reinterpretation of something that people love.

I think “Footloose” or “Tarzan” kind of made me a little more mature with my outlook on that. That’s something I learned the hard way, and I’ve gotten to be a lot better about it now. 

Q: Obviously the “Dolemite” experience went well. How was the second trip to Eddie Murphy Island?

A: It didn’t feel like a return to Eddie Murphy Island, it felt like I never left. We went so quickly from “Dolemite” into “Coming 2 America,” and while we were in the downtime in between we were selling “Dolemite” and doing the whole awards circuit, so it felt like I was part of the Eddie Murphy family and happy to be that. 

But really, I’m grateful that I was able to do “Dolemite” first, because there was a lot of trust going into “Coming 2 America.” There are things that we do that I’d have to tell Eddie, look, I want to sprinkle some John Landis whimsy into this. (Landis directed the original film.) I want to do a musical number or two. Wesley Snipes is a warlord from a neighboring country literally called Nextdooria.

Craig Brewer on ‘Dolemite Is My Name’ and life on Eddie Murphy Island

You want the actor to do a good job, and with Eddie you know it’s going to be that. But it’s also what style is this director going to bring to this world that is so connected to his legacy? And I think because all during “Dolemite” we talked about the movies of John Landis, and we talked about music and movies and influences, I think he knew that I had the love for it and would at least take a good stab at doing right by it. 

Q: We often think of directors or maybe screenwriters as the “author” of a film, but Eddie Murphy has more creative ownership of this than anyone else, right?

A: There were times when I would talk to people at the studio and if there were ever any conflict I would say, please remember we are not making a movie where we cast Eddie Murphy. We have been cast to make an Eddie Murphy movie, and the sooner we all dial in to that reality the better it will be. I’d just been through it and was quite comfortable in this Eddie Murphy world. 

Q: It seems like primary shooting got done just before COVID really hit?

A: It probably wrapped in late November (of 2019). 

Post-production started with me being in Los Angeles in January and February. Then COVID hit and we had to totally reinvent the wheel of how movies are cut together and edited. Hollywood was learning how to do it in real time. There were about a dozen movies that were the big movies earmarked for 2020 and “Coming 2 America” was one of them, and so all of us were at different stages. 

You would hear about other movies, about where they were in the stages. I remember hearing that “Top Gun: Maverick” got to actually test in front of an audience before COVID hit. We never got to test in front of a full theater audience. We had to do it in different ways. It was very difficult and time-consuming to edit a movie by Zoom. I couldn’t be in the same room with my editors. 

Q: It made it easier that you had created a nice work space in Memphis? You weren’t working from your laptop at your apartment. 

A: Right when COVID started they were just finishing my projection system and everything. I think the last couple of days that they were working on my sound system and internet and linking it all up, they were all wearing masks. There was this day where I relocated back to Memphis, when I felt like it was safe enough to fly. I felt like I had to get home. I wanted to see my kids and be a part of that bubble. 

By then my facility here at Crosstown had just been finished, so I thought maybe my sound system here can be linked up to their mixing board (in Los Angeles) and that’s when I started working from Crosstown. It was amazing. I don’t think I’ll ever go back. I think that’s how I’m going to work from now on. I’ll just be on Zoom and try to work out of my facility (in post-production) and try to be a normal person for a bit. 

Q: You used the word bubble, and we’re all in our own bubbles in different ways now, but you really do have sort of a bubble going on. Earlier in your career you lived in Midtown and had a production office on South Main. Now you have separate living and working spaces within Crosstown Concourse. That’s working for you?

A: I love it. I really love Crosstown. I feel like I have my own little community and that’s really important to me. It’s good for me to have a space I feel is safe where I can be a guy walking around in sweats and T-shirts, where maybe in Hollywood I couldn’t do that. Or maybe I could and just choose not to. The majority of my work is going to the elevator and going downstairs.

Q: When we talked as “Dolemite” was getting set to debut, it was the first time you’d ever been promoting one thing while actively in production on something else. I gather that’s not currently the case, but do you have any sense, that you can share, about what’s next?

A: I’m writing a bunch of things right now. Like a lot of people, I’m writing and preparing projects and waiting to see what the world will allow. There’s a lot of uncertainty that everyone is experiencing with movies and projects because we’re dealing still with the waning days of a global pandemic and what work is going to be permitted. 

The other thing is that as much as it feels like I’ve just done two movies back to back, I also just did two seasons of “Empire” back to back. So I feel like for the past four years I haven’t stopped, and it’s nice to stop. It’s nice to wake up and say, maybe today I’m going to go wander around an antique store. Maybe today I’ll learn how to make a dish. So it’s been nice for me to cycle down. 

The other thing is that I’m genuinely excited about “Coming 2 America” coming out. It’s a moment I will never be able to duplicate. Think about it, man. Millions of people around the globe are going to be watching “Coming 2 America” all at the same time. 

Usually when a movie comes out, you’re in constant competition with other movies. I think the finale of “WandaVision” is (the same day), but otherwise we’re it. 

I just want people to enjoy it. I want people to get around the TV with their family and have an Eddie Murphy weekend.