We all know that Eddie Murphy will end up on screen again—whether as a jivin’ animal, an obese person near a pool, in a third sequel to June ’09’s awful-sounding NowhereLand, or (hail mary) Inglorious Bastards. But the man who made Buckwheat even bunnier just announced to Extra (classy) that he’s throwing in the towel when it comes to feature films…
“I have close to 50 movies and it’s like, why am I in the movies?” he said, adding, “I’ve done that part now. I’ll go back to the stage and do standup.”
All for it. A (hypothetical) HBO-special with a rowdy blessing from Chris Rock is just what the guy needs. But what about Murphy’s planned Beverly Hills Cop 4 with Brett Ratner and a poor guy dressed up as “PG” who’s contractually obligated to wave and wave…
Murphy, 47, said that while a “Beverly Hills Cop 4″ flick was in the works, he didn’t want to do it, because “the movie wasn’t ready to be done.”
But will he still put on his Axel Foley body suit anyhow? Murphy’s tiny alien family comedy, Meet Dave (above), opens and possibly flops on July 11th, and he’s currently filming A Thousand Words with Brian Robbins, who directed Meet Dave and Norbit and, uh, Good Burger and The Show concert film with Biggie Smalls. Yeah, it’s probably hopeless, unless there’s a Rosetta Stone for the F-word. Oh yeah, it’s called Eddie Murphy Raw. Hopeless.
UPLATE UPDATE: Our friends at Latino Review spoke with Ratner who put his tan smack down on those MTV-bred rumors that BHC4 would be PG. Evidently this was before Murphy expressed his displeasure with the film’s progress…
“Dont believe everything you read on the internet. Believe me, this is going to be a hard core ‘R’ Beverly Hills Cop. I start shooting next year”
Hard core, kids. Hear that?
UPDATE 07/01/08: Murphy seemed far more enthusiastic about Beverly Hills Cop 4 in a recent chat with, oddly enough, MTV…
“I’ve been in a bunch of different meetings with people, ‘Oh, we have to take Axel this way.” I ain’t seen no script yet [but] I’m not rolling out ‘Beverly Hills Cop 4’ for it to be a continuation of ‘Beverly Hills Cop III,’ which was a crock of shit,” Murphy said. “I wanna do a good one!”
He added…
“If I do it, it’s gonna be some shit that’s right!”
So, basically, as Brett Ratner said, “it’s going to be hard core” and stuff. Could this turn out good?
post inspired by FirstShowing
June 30th, 2008 at 6:05 pm
he notified ET! after his Oscar lose for Dreamgirls in February of 2007…everyone already knew.
June 30th, 2008 at 6:20 pm
This is the best news I’ve heard all day. I miss hearing him say Motherfucker.
June 30th, 2008 at 6:33 pm
Brian Robbins… my new least favorite director.
June 30th, 2008 at 6:52 pm
Who will fill the void he leaves? I can already feel the vaccuum of his absense.
What about, Yep Another 48 Hours, Norbit 2 and Nutty Professor 3 Klumped?
He leaves the worthless comedy sequel movies to Martin Lawrence? Uhh
If I had his money I’d retire 8 years ago.
June 30th, 2008 at 6:59 pm
about damn time.
June 30th, 2008 at 7:28 pm
Just wait till Shrek 4 comes around.
June 30th, 2008 at 8:05 pm
imagine being the SUV in front of that face…
June 30th, 2008 at 9:48 pm
Let me know when he’s dead… otherwise I don’t give a flying fuck about eddie
June 30th, 2008 at 10:50 pm
Well I’m glad to hear about the stand up. Beverly Hills Cop 4 didnt’ need to be made anyway.
June 30th, 2008 at 11:03 pm
Thanks alot Eddie !!!
I have to read about this on /Film?
July 1st, 2008 at 12:20 am
@Mr. Death, I wouldn’t be surprised if he signed on for shrek 4 and 5 and the spin off movie.
Someone posted in the George Lucas article about people who need to retire and unfortunatly I think it might be his time. Doing the shrek movies is ok but no more of these washedout movies. He’s going to end up like Mike Myers doing the same thing over and over again.
July 1st, 2008 at 4:06 am
HARDCORE HE SAYS!
July 1st, 2008 at 8:41 am
nooooo ill miss murphy………NOT
i can watch coming to america and ill be good
thankyoufor coming to america Eddie
July 1st, 2008 at 11:21 am
Um I think that Eddie Murphy still has a bit left in him. Now granted his last movie wasn’t very good. I think he might be able to get a bunch of money with this one. It looks like it’s kid friendly enough to be a Daddy Daycare type Success. It also looks semi-sort of almost funny
July 1st, 2008 at 10:47 pm
I agree BHC3 was a crock of shit I am down for a new good one; I thought the first two were awesome
other than that Eddie Murphy hasn’t made a great movie in a long time and I loved his standup