Coming to America (1988): 20 Shocking Facts You Totally Missed

Coming to America (1988): 20 facts you didn't know This entire movie was almost titled The Quest. Paramount thought the original name sounded like a sword-and-sorcery epic and forced a rename. Eddie Murphy also refused to play a character named Eddie, which is what the early drafts had. He pushed for a full rewrite to become Prince Akeem so audiences wouldn't see a version of himself in royal robes. Paramount then insisted on adding at least one white actor to the cast for "balance," so Murphy handpicked Louie Anderson, calling him the funniest white guy he knew. Arsenio Hall walked away from voicing Winston Zeddemore on the animated Ghostbusters show to take this role. The McDowell's set nearly got the production sued by actual McDonald's lawyers, and the crew wrote an elaborate fake employee manual to explain why McDowell's was legally distinct. Samuel L. Jackson robs that fake restaurant in one of his very first credited film appearances. Cuba Gooding Jr. also made his silent film debut in the barbershop scene, just sitting in a chair. Rick Baker based Saul the barber directly on his own father-in-law, and Baker's father-in-law even doubled as the hand on close-ups. Baker also built more than 40 custom sets of teeth for the various characters Murphy and Hall played. The mic drop after Randy Watson's terrible cover of The Greatest Love of All? Completely improvised. The entire "my mama named me Clay, I'm gonna say Clay" argument was never scripted either. And Nile Rodgers wrote the Soul Glow jingle, which was so convincing that some viewers thought it was a real hair product. Murphy specifically brought back director John Landis from Trading Places, but the working relationship had completely soured this time around. In 2017, a Chicago restaurant briefly transformed itself into a real McDowell's pop-up, complete with Big Micks and Sexual Chocolate milkshakes. In 2021, Coming to America was formally preserved in the Library of Congress National Film Registry. And the bonus: those two homeless men Prince Akeem hands cash to on the park bench aren't random extras. They're Randolph and Mortimer Duke, the exact same characters and same actors from Trading Places, now broke and destitute after their earlier scheme collapsed. Coming to America is quietly the direct sequel to Trading Places, and most viewers have watched both films their entire lives without ever noticing. ⏱ Timestamps in the chapters below 👇 Which fact surprised you most? Drop it in the comments