‘Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F’ is latest in long line of movie comedy franchises
“Beverly Hills Cop” and its young exuberant star Eddie Murphy were dominant forces on the cultural landscape as soon as the action comedy opened Dec. 5, 1984 on 1,532 screens, earning over $15 million in its first five days of release. “Beverly Hills Cop” garnered nearly $235 million domestically and another $81.6 million internationally.
The comedy even earned an Oscar nomination for its screenplay while Murphy hit superstar status thanks to his dazzling comedic turn as Axel Foley, a freewheeling Detroit cop who is the ultimate fish out of water when a murder investigation leads him to the by-the-book Beverly Hills police department. And the soundtrack album featuring the film’s composer Harold Faltermeyer’s hit “Axel F,” as well as the Pointer Sisters‘ “Neutron Dance” and Glenn Frey’s “The Heat is On,” hit No. 1 on the Billboard chart.
Three years later, Murphy returned in “Beverly Hills Cop II,” which made close to $300 million worldwide; the poorly received 1994 “Beverly Hills Cop III,” faltered at the box office only earning $42.6 million in the U.S. And now the heat is on for the fourth time.
Murphy, now 63, is back as his treasured character in Netflix’s “Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F,” which finds the streetwise wisecracking Detroit cop heading back to California after the lives of his estranged lawyer daughter (Taylour Paige) and his former cop-turned-private-investigator Billy Rosewood (Judge Reinhold) are threatened.
“Beverly Hills Cop” isn’t the only 40-year-old comedy movie franchise resurrected this year. “Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire,” which reunited original stars Bill Murray, Ernie Hudson, Dan Aykroyd and Annie Potts, was released earlier this year to mixed to negative reviews and $201.8 million gross worldwide. There have been numerous comedy franchises over the years from including the Bob Hope–Bing Crosby “Road” classics, Tyler Perry’s Madea box office hits and silly Billy antics of the “Police Academy’ series.
MGM made three of the best during the Golden Age of Hollywood. “The Thin Man,” which celebrates its 90th anniversary. this year, received four Oscar nominations including best picture. Based on other popular novel by Dashiell Hammett, the original “Thin Man” is a perfect blend of comedy and mystery with snappy, sophisticated and rather naughty dialogue and two of the studio’s dream stars William Powell and Myrna Loy as the delightfully fun couple Nick and Nora Charles who never met a cocktail they didn’t devour. Adding to the fun is the couple’s scene-stealing wire fox terrier, Asta. “The Thin Man” spawned five sequels the last being 1947’s “Song of the Thin Man.” The best are 1936’s “After the Thin Man,” featuring a young Jimmy Stewart, and 1939’s “Another Thin Man,” which marked Powell’s return to feature films after battling cancer.
MGM won an honorary Oscar in 1943 for its uber popular “Andy Hardy” series “for its achievement in representing the American Way of Life.” Of course, the “American Way of Life” depicted in the sentimental comedy series was distinctly white and Christian. MGM introduced Mickey Rooney as the love-sick teenager always getting into scrapes in 1937’s “A Family Affair” with Lionel Barrymore as his father and Spring Byington as his mother. The second film, 1937’s “Your Only Young Once” saw major cast changes with Lewis Stone replacing Barrymore as Judge Hardy and Fay Holden as his mother. Supposedly, Stone and Holden were too expensive for this “B” movie.
Ann Rutherford was also cast as Andy’s on-and-off again girlfriend Polly Benedict and Judy Garland made three Andy movies as the effervescent Betsy Booth. Other young MGM talent such as Lana Turner, Kathryn Grayson and Esther Williams were showcased in the series. There were in total 16 films in the series with Rooney playing the character from ages 16 to 25. Twelve years after 1946’s “Love Laughs at Andy Hardy,” MGM attempted to revive the franchise with “Andy Hardy Comes Home,” which bombed with both critics and audiences.
Though not as well remembered as “The Thin Man” or the “Andy Hardy” series, MGM’s “Maisie’ produced 10 films between 1939-47 starring Ann Sothern. Originally, the studio had bought the rights to Wilson Collinson’s novel “Dark Dame” for Jean Harlow. But when she died in 1937 the project was put on hold until blonde bombshell Sothern was hired. The first entry “Maisie” released in 1939 finds the Brooklyn burlesque performer stranded in small Wyoming town where she gets a job on a ranch and finds love. The New York Times stated that Sothern “who is probably already one of your favorite flouncers, flouncing through an unconventional Western comedy…Miss Sothern, hitherto a reasonably restrained actress, throws left hooks, gags and fits of temperament with surprising abandon.” Not only did Sothern play the irrepressible Maisie in 10 films, she also brought the brash blonde to radio from 1945-53. The show introduced the catch phrase “Likewise, I’m sure.”
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