Harlem Nights

Eddie Murphy wrote, directed, produced and starred in this comedy, set in the 1930s, about a team of people running illegal businesses out of a nightclub and their interactions with rival gangsters and corrupt police.

‍

The film did well at the box office but was difficult to pull together, was panned by major critics, and had some bad luck surrounding it.

‍

Much of the press around the film knocked Murphy’s attempts at both the writing and the directing. He himself said that he wanted to direct a film just to see if he could, and that the experience didn’t turn out as he expected. Murphy never directed another film.

‍

The script was thrown together quickly and loosely because Murphy expected to collaborate on-set with Richard Pryor. But Pryor would show up, say his lines and leave, which was a big disappointment for Murphy especially because Pryor and Foxx would crack jokes between scenes, keeping the cast and crew rolling with laughter.

‍

The bad luck included a lawsuit during production and a shooting during a screening of the film that lead to AMC theaters cancelling the showings and installing metal detectors. The lawsuit, which was filed against Eddie Murphy, alleged that an actress was fired because she turned down Murphy’s sexual advances. Murphy said that the woman “just wasn’t working out”. They eventually settled out of court.

‍

There are moments of funny, clownish humor, but overall it seems like Murphy wanted to give the world a glimpse of rich, successful Black people, as he did with Coming to America. But this is overly curated, overly romanticized and noticeably out of balance. It's set in Harlem in the 30s but there is none of the dirty, impoverished grittiness that would have been the reality at that time.  

‍

The best thing about this, in my opinion, is that it's a snapshot of very specific moment in time. We see Red Foxx in his final film before he died, Richard Pryor just before he set himself on fire, and a young Eddie Murphy at the height of his box-office draw.

‍