STREAM EXCLUSIVE ORIGINALS

OPINION: Why Eddie Murphy Can Win At Stand-Up In A Politically Correct World

The iconic comedian is teasing a return to the stage after 30 years.

When one of the most successful and iconic stand-up comics of all time nonchalantly drops that he’s plotting a return to the stage after a more than 30-year layoff, it’s pretty much a big deal. “I’m going to do it again,” Eddie Murphy told a pleasantly surprised Jerry Seinfeld during a segment on the fellow funnyman’s irreverent Netflix interview series Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee. “Everything just has to be right. I got to go to the clubs and work out. I’m going to do that again.”

The career trajectory of Murphy has now become Hollywood folklore. During the late ‘70s, he was just a scuffling Long Island comic trying to find his way in the competitive (and at times unforgiving) New York City comedy club circuit. Yet, by the next decade, Eddie Murphy found himself being universally hailed as Saturday Night Live’s most important and drop-dead hilarious TV commodity since late wild man John Belushi tore through Studio 8H at 30 Rockefeller Plaza with eyebrow-raising supremacy. 

A leap to film followed, as such landmark comedies as 48 Hrs, Trading PlacesBeverly Hills Cop, and Coming to America transformed the brash talent into the biggest box office juggernaut in the universe, groundbreaking territory for an African-American kid whose earliest gig was doing stand-up at a Chinese restaurant.

 

Murphy’s stand-up, at its best, has always been fueled by organic, universal truths.

But his most underrated miracle was taking comedy to new coliseum heights. Yes, while most historians rightly so rank the brilliant Richard Pryor as the comedy G.O.A.T., Eddie Murphy became the genre’s first unabashed rock star. He was a combustible amalgamation of his idols, the aforementioned Pryor and, strangely enough, Elvis Presley, with a potent dash of Prince Rogers Nelson. Eddie made stand-up sexy. Leather-suit clad and unapologetically defiant, the man was selling out arenas before Kevin Hart was learning long division.

But Murphy’s brand of profane pop culture theatrics could also be quite controversial. Which is why when news officially broke late last week that the reclusive legend, who rarely grants sit-downs, was close to signing a whopping $70 million deal with Netflix for a series of stand-up comedy specials, one could not help but wonder what an Eddie Murphy show would look like in these politically correct times? 

Certainly his benchmark 1983 HBO special, Delirious, and 1987’s Raw, which still stands as the highest grossing theatrical stand-up comedy film of all time, pulling in an impressive $50.5 million, would be the subject of fervent protest today. In fact, while Murphy’s two monumental performances are frequently celebrated as the best of the high-flying ‘80s era, even back then they were criticized for what some critics viewed as brazenly homophobic and misogynistic material. 

 

“I got some rules when I do my stand-up…” Murphy quipped at the start of Delirious. “Fag**ts aren’t allowed to look at my ass while I’m on stage. That’s why I keep moving while up here.” There were AIDS jokes targeted squarely at the expense of gay men. Fifteen years later, Murphy apologized to the LGBTQ community for the hurtful, offensive material. “I deeply regret any pain all this has caused,” he said in a statement. “Just like the rest of the world, I am more educated about AIDS in 1996 than I was in 1981. I think it is unfair to take the words of a misinformed 21-year-old and apply them to an informed 35-year-old man. I know how serious an issue AIDS is the world over. I know that AIDS isn't funny. It's 1996 and I'm a lot smarter about AIDS now.” 

And just how would the empowering #MeToo generation of today react to Murphy riffing on marrying an African woman named Unfufu because she’s easier to control than American women? “I have to go off to the woods of Africa and find me some crazy, naked zebra b**** that knows nothing about money,” he joked in Raw before launching into a highly stereotypical impersonation of an African woman’s voice. Yikes. 

Today Murphy, a doting family man, has evolved quite nicely. Still, it’s kind of wild to hear him lament over what he sees as comedy becoming defanged. There’s an intriguing discussion with Seinfeld on whether or not a joke about the homeless would fly in today’s land-mine riddled comedy landscape. “Yeah, you can’t use the word midget,” Murphy mused, when he opened up about his obsession with the Little Women reality show franchise. “[They’ll say] that’s the same as saying n****.” 

 

But perhaps he’s selling his prodigious gifts short. Eddie Murphy’s greatness was never a product of four-letter words or third-rail shenanigans that would make the most woke amongst us break out the pitchforks. Murphy’s stand-up, at its best, has always been fueled by organic, universal truths. A child’s palpable, laugh-inducing happiness eating ice cream; reveling in Star Trek fandom; the surreal experience you can only find at a Black movie theater; Fat Elvis; the absurdity of family cookouts; the ubiquitous “welfare” burger. This is material that would still kill in 2019. 

And yet there’s a huge chunk of thirty-somethings who grew up only knowing 58-year-old Murphy from his infectious voice work in the his over $2 billion grossing, fluffy animated films (MulanShrekShrek 2Shrek the ThirdShrek Forever) and saccharine family comedies (The Nutty ProfessorDr. Doolittle, and Daddy Day Care). And that’s a pity. Because Murphy is capable of still being a surreal revelation. (While ‘92’s Boomerang remains his most hilarious, quote-worthy movie from top to bottom of the ‘90s, both Life and Bowfinger go even deeper in showcasing arguably the most complete comedic force of his generation.)  

Suffering through a string of unmitigated, embarrassing bombs (Beverly Hills Cop IIIHoly ManThe Adventures of Pluto NashImagine That and A Thousand Words) made his Oscar-nominated comeback role as the tortured James “Thunder” Early in the 2006 musical drama Dreamgirls that much more satisfying.  

But just in case you still find yourself asking if a gentler, kindler Murphy could make a successful return to the stand-up stage like his protégés Dave Chappelle and Chris Rock did in their buzz-heavy, pot-stirring Netflix specials, it would be wise not to bet against the old man. 

When Murphy was given the prestigious Mark Twain Prize in 2015 at the Kennedy Center -- the nation’s top award for humor -- he showed a glimpse of what could be. “Bill has one of these,” he sheepishly grinned on stage, alluding to disgraced comedy giant and fellow Mark Twain winner Bill Cosby, who in 2018 would be sentenced to 3 to 10 years in prison for drugging and assaulting Andrea Constand at his home. 

The irony, of course, was that Cosby, the once vaunted, clean-living role model… America’s dad, never passed up the chance to scold Murphy for what he deemed as unseemly foul language (the drop dead funny exchange was surreally captured in Raw ), complete with Murphy’s impeccable take of an acid-tongued Richard Pryor advising Eddie to tell Bill to “have a Coke and a smile and shut the f*ck up.”) 

“Did you all make him give it back?” Murphy asked before breaking into his uncanny impersonation of Cosby refusing the give back the award. “I would like to talk to some of the people who feel like I should give back my motherf—in' trophies,” he riffed as the audience roared with uneasy laughter. 

It was bold. It was brilliant. It was dangerous. It was Eddie Murphy. 

 

 

Latest News

Subscribe for BET Updates

Provide your email address to receive our newsletter.


By clicking Subscribe, you confirm that you have read and agree to our Terms of Use and acknowledge our Privacy Policy. You also agree to receive marketing communications, updates, special offers (including partner offers) and other information from BET and the Paramount family of companies. You understand that you can unsubscribe at any time.