Read an oral history of the failed 1989 Coming to America pilot

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https://level.medium.com/an-oral-his...t-3df24504d651

Following the massive success of Eddie Murphy's 1988 film Coming to America, CBS ordered a spinoff pilot from Murphy's production company in 1989. "The plot: Akeem, now the king, sends his unruly little brother Tariq to New York City to attend Queens College," writes Bonsu Thompson. "Tariq was played by an uber-talented new firecracker on the L.A. stand-up scene named Tommy Davidson. Paul Bates reprised his movie character Oha ('she’s a queeeeen to beee'), now Tariq’s personal aide; John Hancock also appears (as their landlord and eventual boss), as did a pre-House Party A.J. Johnson. It was Davidson, though, who seemed destined for 1990s superstardom." CBS didn't pick up the pilot, but it ended up airing as part of CBS Summer Playhouse.

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Kind of weird that CBS would be airing Square Pegs in 1989.

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IMDB (Series Info) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0911189/


Wikipedia (Series Info) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coming...rica_(TV_pilot)




Video Description: Based on the film of the same name, this pilot places Prince Tariq of Zamunda and his assistant Oha in the house of a family in Queens, New York. Irresponsible Prince Tariq of Zamunda has been exiled to attend college in America by the king, his brother Akeem. It however, takes only nine days living in Queens, New York for Tariq to blow his allowance. So in order to make ends meet, Tariq and his assistant Oha, find jobs in the diner owned by their landlord, Carl Mackey.

[Old School]

Den Of Geek https://www.denofgeek.com/tv/coming-...v-series-fail/



As Amazon Prime Video’s premiere of sequel Coming 2 America ends decades’ worth of wait for fans of the 1988 Eddie Murphy comedy classic, Coming to America, it seemed as good a time as any to look back at the first attempt to capitalize on the franchise, the 1989 spinoff television pilot. Indeed, it’s an endeavor of which few fans are aware, and a fascinating failure during an era in which television was churning out cinematic-inspired sitcoms left and right.

Of course, the Coming to America movie was a resounding success, a widely-accessible romantic comedy that permeated pop culture in a manner evocative of the A-list heyday of star Eddie Murphy. The 1988 film, put in the stable hands of director John Landis, wrought $288 million worldwide box office success, which made the notion of a sequel seem inevitable, despite how long it would take. However, the property first became fodder for Murphy’s burgeoning TV production company, which—bearing the name of the star who skyrocketed on TV off his SNL run—had designs to conquer the small screen via producer’s proxy for a similarly-titled spinoff television series.

Yes, folks, there was a Coming to America television series, specifically an unsold pilot (archived for posterity on YouTube, as seen immediately below), which starred a stupendous standup comedy talent in Tommy Davidson, who would eventually achieve fame—alongside Jim Carrey and the Wayanses—on early-90s sketch series In Living Color. In one of the pilot’s few wise moves, Davidson wasn’t there to fill Murphy’s substantially-lucrative shoes to play a generic television version of Zamunda’s Prince Akeem Joffer. Rather, the pilot opted to expand the movie mythos by having Davidson star as Prince Tariq, the heretofore unmentioned—and even more spoiled—younger brother of Akeem, who has sent him to Queens for a similar journey to sow his royal oats.

Overall, this premise was far from the worst possible setup for a would-be Coming to America spinoff series. In attempting to replicate the film’s Akeem/Semmi dynamic, the pilot further solidified its movie connections by teaming Davidson’s Tariq with a character from the movie, royal servant Oha (best remembered for belting out his “Queen to Be” wedding song), a role reprised by Paul Bates (who is also back for Coming 2 America). With that, the pilot centered itself on Tariq and Oha’s struggles to survive in Queens after the spendthrift prince had quickly blown through his royal allowance, forcing the duo to—again, replicating the Akeem/Semmi dilemma—resort to the unfathomable measure of earning wages through some sort of manual labor—in this instance working at a diner owned by their exceedingly generous landlord, Carl Mackey (John Hancock), operated by his family in wife Pauline (Hattie Winston) and daughter Phyliss (Paris Vaughan).

So, what went wrong with the Coming to America pilot? The short answer is everything. As an extensive oral history on the pilot by Bonsu Thompson makes clear, the would-be series came to fruition as a gesture by Paramount to Eddie Murphy, who had just formed his Eddie Murphy Television shingle. Seeing as the star had just delivered the studio its biggest film of the year, a pitch—by the star himself—for a television series based on said film seemed like a no-brainer. Thus, the pilot was greenlit as part of a first-look deal with Paramount and CBS, which was dangling an initial 13-episode run. However, after being unable to procure original movie scribes Barry Blaustein and David Sheffield, the pilot, directed by Tony Singletary, eventually took shape in 1989 under the auspices of showrunner/writer/executive producer Ken Hecht (reportedly deceased), a white creator who had fielded successful runs on shows centered on black stars such as Diff’rent Strokes and Webster; success that he was not destined to replicate here, purportedly due to creative clashes.

“The executive producer, Ken Hecht, had carte blanche,” explained Davidson. “The material was wack. I had a great cast, but it was more of a dictatorship style of TV: ‘Just do what I say.'” It was a hard pill to swallow for the talented Davidson, who, within industry circles had become one of the hottest prospects out there, and a clear contender to Eddie Murphy’s throne as box office king; a notion that led some behind-the-scenes personnel to speculate that Murphy—despite having an office ten minutes away from the stage, according to Davidson—neglected the series, possibly out of professional spite. Indeed, Davidson reveals that, at the time, he was circling an offer—by CBS, no less—to co-star alongside Candice Bergen on the gestating sitcom that would become Murphy Brown, and even had a three-year holding deal with Disney to, as he put it, “do anything I wanted.” Yet, to his peril, he ended up choosing Coming to America amidst a candidate pool that consisted of a teen-aged Marlon Wayans and, interestingly, eventual Coming 2 America co-star Wesley Snipes.

Consequently, with Murphy—who was a credited executive producer—having purportedly left the small screen Coming to America in the lurch, Davidson lacked an advocate powerful enough when butting heads with Hecht, which allegedly created much of the behind-the-scenes friction that resulted in an array of uninspiring comedy and inauthentic African cultural tropes. Yet, Davidson wasn’t alone on that front. As Clint Smith (Vice President of Eddie Murphy Television) also divulged, “Oh, me and Ken bumped heads all the f###ing time. I thought he was an a$$hole. His script was horrible. We were like, ‘That sh#t ain’t funny!’ But he had some credits. The studio wanted him and me and my partner were rookies. Tommy almost saved it.”

The Coming to America pilot would be rife with the low-hanging-fruit of artificial-sounding contemporaneous pop culture references—notably with one scene in which Tariq looks through a copy of Donald Trump’s “The Art of the Deal” for advice to make quick cash in real estate—and relied on Davidson frequently delving into his bag of standup impressions, notably Stevie Wonder and Michael Jackson, both of whom—perhaps by no coincidence—Murphy had famously done on SNL. Thus, despite an admirable effort, the pilot practically fell apart in front of the viewers. Moreover, it seems that even the casting of Davidson left the project snake-bit from the start, since producers had their hearts set on another candidate. “Tommy Davidson was pretty good, but we wanted Marlon Wayans,” explains Smith. “Marlon did a really great audition. He was a kid, but he killed it. He was a natural. But he already had commitments.”

Regardless, the increasingly inauspicious project eventually overcame the tumult of its production in time to make the national airwaves on big-three network CBS one 1989 Tuesday evening… which happened to be the Fourth of July! In a move that’s hard not to perceive as an act of self-sabotage, the Eye Network branded Coming to America with its CBS Summer Playhouse anthology label, relegating its one-and-done appearance to occur during a barbecue and fireworks-filled night celebrating American independence, all but guaranteeing that it would be rendered dead on arrival ratings-wise. That, of course, is what happened. The pilot was left unsold and the notion of a Coming to America television series was quickly forgotten by the general public, barely even qualifying as fodder for trivia.

Coming 2 America, which will showcase a very different royal family dynamic than its ill-fated small screen cousin, premieres on Amazon Prime Video on March 5.

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Coming to America is one of Eddie Murphy’s most iconic films — a timeless comedy classic that defined a generation. But did you know there was a spinoff attempt that flopped so hard it was quickly buried and nearly forgotten? In this video, we uncover the failed Coming to America TV show spinoff that tried (and failed) to capture the magic of the original. From weak writing and poor execution to baffling creative decisions, we break down exactly what went wrong and how it almost dented Eddie Murphy’s legendary career.

• 00:00 Intro
• 03:08 The Plot
• 04:16 The Flops
• 06:18 What Went Wrong?
• 07:23 Casting Failure
• 08:46 Lost Legacy

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Retro Television Review: Coming to America 1.1 “Pilot”

Posted on August 21, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Thursdays, I will be reviewing Coming to America, which aired on CBS in 1989. Almost the entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!



Fresh off the success of the film Coming To America, Eddie Murphy served as executive producer of a series based on the film. How did that work out? Read on to find out!

Episode 1.1 “Pilot”

(Dir by Tony Singletary, originally aired on July 4th, 1989)

The pilot for Coming to America begins with the story already in progress. We get an overhead shot of New York while Prince Tariq (Tommy Davidson, speaking with an unconvincing accent) explains that he and his minder, Omar (Paul Bates), have been sent to America so that Tariq can attend college. (Tariq is established as being the younger brother of the character that Eddie Murphy played in the original film.) Tariq and Omar have rented a room from diner owner Carl Mackey (John Hancock). Carl is a curmudgeon. Tariq expects everyone to treat him like royalty. Carl grumbles about not getting to eat unhealthy food before a doctor’s visit. Tariq does an extended Stevie Wonder impersonation.

Uh-oh, Tariq’s out of money! In just nine months, he spends all of his money on movies and clothes. What can Tariq do? Maybe he and Omar can work in Carl’s diner! Uh-oh, Tariq’s started a dance party in the diner and he orders Omar to join the fun! Carl shows up at an inopportune time and Omar is fired. Can Tariq take responsibility for his actions?

“I’m a Beverly Hills Cop, you’re a Beverly Hills cop too and in 48 hours, we’re Trading Places.” Tariq says at one point and seriously, you have to wonder why they didn’t toss a reference to The Golden Child in there. Tariq is royalty so it certainly would have made more sense for him to refer to himself as being a Golden Child as opposed to being a Beverly Hills Cop. That’s the type of show this is, though. The humor is heavy-handed but it also misses way too many opportunities.

My friend from Australia, Mark, sent me the link for this pilot (it’s on YouTube) and he dared me to see how much I could watch before turning it off in disgust. I managed to get through the entire thing but it wasn’t easy. To be honest, I nearly stopped this thing as soon as Tariq’s opening narration began. When that much exposition is stuffed into the opening narration, you know that you’re about watch a disjointed mess of a program. Indeed, one could argue that calling this program disjointed is a case of me being charitable. In the end, the main problem is that, after all the build-up of Tariq being a prince, the plot itself could just as easily been the plot of a thousand other mediocre sitcoms. How many times did Lisa and Kelly have to take jobs at the Max in Saved By The Bell? Both Malibu CA and One World suggested that working at a restaurant was the best — perhaps the only! — way to learn responsibility. The Coming to America diner looks almost exactly like the City Guys diner. How is this not a Peter Engel production?

Coming to America aired once. There was never a second episode. Hence, today, we’ve started and ended a series! Next week, something new will premiere in this time slot. Hopefully, it will be better than both Malibu CA and Coming to America.

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Coming to America (1988): 15 Weird Facts You Didn't Know

Remember when Eddie Murphy ruled the box office, and Arsenio Hall had a different wig for every role? Coming to America gave us James Earl Jones booming through the palace and John Amos holding down the fake McDowell's fast food empire.

We’re covering 15 Weird Facts about Coming to America, from behind-the-scenes casting drama to real-life lawsuits.

Chapters:

• 00:00 - Intro
• 01:22 - #15: A Surprising Casting Demand — Louie Anderson
• 02:42 - #14: A Grueling Transformation Process — Rick Baker
• 04:00 - #13: One Actor, Many Faces — Arsenio Hall
• 05:13 - #12: A Reluctant Royal Role — James Earl Jones
• 06:37 - #11: The Catchiest Jingle Ever — Nile Rodgers
• 08:07 - #10: The Spin-Off No One Talks About — Tommy Davidson
• 10:14 - #9: Blink-and-Miss Cameos — Samuel L. Jackson
• 12:17 - #8: An Unexpected Farewell
• 13:59 - #7: A Pop Star Behind the Scenes — Paula Abdul
• 14:43 - #6: From Fast Food to Film — John Amos
• 15:57 - #5: A Royal Reunion Years Later — Madge Sinclair
• 17:19 - #4: A Hidden Movie Connection — Don Ameche
• 18:49 - #3: The Lawsuit That Shook Hollywood — Art Buchwald
• 20:36 - #2: A Bold Casting Rule — Shari Headley
• 21:52 - #1: When Reality Hit the Set

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It Was a Thing on TV: Episode 628--Coming to America (1989 CBS Pilot)

Pilot Month 2026 ends with a television adaptation of one of the big comedic movies from the prior year, but there was no involvement from the key figure which made the movie a hit. Unfortunately, Tommy Davidson is no Eddie Murphy. It didn't help that this aired on a federal holiday, when people are celebrating the country's independence.