Moviegoers adopt movie stars. They spot some fresh face in the orphanage of anonymity, fall in love with him, take him home and become parents to his fame. They are possessive too. When he shines, they smile; when he acts up, they get angry. Or worse, lose interest. If he gets a swelled head, or pays them no heed, they may disown their golden child. There are so many, after all, in the show-biz foundling home.
Such is the problem facing Eddie Murphy, 31, as he awaits this week's release of Boomerang, his first film in two years. From the moment in 1980 when he burst onto Saturday Night Live, Murphy had the audience's eye. More, he had their affection; not just his talent but his boyish good nature won him that. And because comic charisma radiated through the characters he played on SNL, Murphy was able to jump from TV-sketch artist to big-screen draw. He took two roles Richard Pryor had rejected, in 48 HRS. and Trading Places, and overtook Pryor as the top black film star. He stepped into a Sylvester Stallone part, in Beverly Hills Cop, and strutted to the top of the world. Cop II was even bigger. Raw, a concert film, and Coming to America cemented his grand rep. He had a hit pop single and sold-out tours. Fast Eddie had become Vast Eddie -- and then, as sure as excess follows success, Half-Vast.
The decline was subtle: not the incendiary self-destruction of a Pryor -- no drug overdose for Eddie, not even a sex scandal -- just the makings of the sour dissolution of the elder Elvis, a star Murphy much admired. He put on weight and acted like a jerk. Cockiness shaded into arrogance. He seemed to guest-star in his own films (Harlem Nights, Another 48 HRS.), touring them with the grudging ennui of a celebrity at a Kiwanis gig somebody had booked for him. The star was now as remote as Alpha Centauri. A squadron of bodyguards kept him cocooned in satiety, assuring that no fan would rush up to ask, "Weren't you Eddie Murphy?"
There was another crucial factor. As a black star, Murphy was pigeonholed by the industry. "When it comes to black actors," says Reginald Hudlin, the (black) director of Boomerang, "many screenwriters find it difficult to get beyond race." Then, too, the zeitgeist was changing. For all his street sass and gutter gargle, Murphy is basically a middle-class star, closer to Bill Cosby than to the new wave of African-American filmmakers (Spike Lee, John Singleton) and rapmasters (all those hot Ices). Their marketable anger made Eddie look timid, irrelevant, a hipper but still compromised version of the old Negro clown -- a white man's black.