COMING TO AMERICA Sequel Casts Wesley Snipes, James Earl Jones, Leslie Jones, and More
A lot of new cast news has dropped for Eddie Murphy’s Coming To America sequel. The movie is being directed by Craig Brewer (Hustle & Flow, Black Snake Moan), and Arsenio Hall is already set to reprise his role.
Murphy and Hall will be joined Wesley Snipes, Leslie Jones (Ghostbusters), and Kiki Layne (If Beale Street Could Talk). There’s no word on who Jones is playing, but Snipes will play the role of General Izzi, who is the ruler of neighboring African nation, and Layne will play Akeem's daughter, “burdened with feeling like she is the son her father never had.”
Also joining the film are James Earl Jones and Paul Bates, who are reprising their roles as King Jaffe Joffer and Oha, “Prince Akeem’s stiff-upper-lipped manservant and bodyguard.”
The original 1988 comedy followed Murphy and Prince Akeem, “a spoiled prince from the fictional African nation of Zamunda, who arrives in Queens, New York, and in undercover fashion gets a job at a McDonald’s knockoff while trying to find a wife.”
The sequel will focus on Akeem, now set to become king, “discovering he has a son he never knew about, a street-savvy Queens native named Lavelle. Honoring his father's dying wish to groom his son as a new crowned prince, Akeem must once again return to America.”
It’s kinda crazy that after all these years we are getting a sequel to Coming To America, but there’s a great team of talent behind its development. I haven’t seen the first film in a long time, so I’ll be revisiting it soon.