Harlem Nights

''Harlem Nights'' is a 1989 American crime comedy drama film starring, written, and directed by Eddie Murphy. The film co-stars Richard Pryor, Redd Foxx (in his last film appearance before his death in 1991), Danny Aiello, Michael Lerner, Della Reese, and Murphy's older brother Charlie. The film was released theatrically on November 17, 1989, by Paramount Pictures. The film tells the story of "Sugar" Ray and Vernest "Quick" Brown as a team running a nightclub in the late 1930s in Harlem while contending with gangsters and corrupt police officials.

''Harlem Nights'' is, as of 2025, Eddie Murphy's only directorial effort. He had always wanted to direct and star in a period piece, as well as work with Pryor, whom he considered his greatest influence in stand-up comedy. Reviewers panned the film, with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert choosing ''Harlem Nights'' as ranking among the worst films of 1989. At the 10th Golden Raspberry Awards, Murphy won the Razzie for Worst Screenplay.

Despite having a strong opening, the $30 million film was a disappointment at the box office, grossing $60.9 million in the United States and Canada.

Plot

In 1918, Harlem, small-time gambling operator Sugar Ray is nearly killed by an irate unlucky gambler until Ray's seven-year-old errand boy Vernest Brown shoots the gambler in the head. Learning that Vernest is an orphan, Ray decides to raise the boy as his son.

In 1938, the now affluent Ray and Vernest—known as Quick—run the high-class "Club Sugar Ray", with gambling and dancing in the front, and a brothel in the back. The club's success undermines the businesses of ruthless white gangster Bugsy Calhoune. Determined to eliminate his competition, he sends corrupt and racist police sergeant Phil Cantone to demand the majority of the club's earnings each week. Knowing the club cannot survive, Ray insists on relocating to another city but Quick is eager to fight back. Ray chastizes Quick for his reckless immaturity, cautioning that he will only get himself killed challenging the powerful Calhoune. Instead, Ray suggests a plan that will earn their friends $50,000 each before they relocate: on the night of a highly anticipated boxing match between their friend, World Heavyweight Champion Jack Jenkins, and Michael Kirkpatrick, Ray's team will rob the mainly-Calhoune owned betting houses of at least $750,000 in cash. Ray and his associates bet on Kirkpatrick to win, tricking Calhoune into believing they have convinced Jenkins to lose the fight and guarantee their success. In turn, Calhoune bets $500,000 of his own money on Kirkpatrick.

Calhoune has his black enforcer Tommy Smalls murdered for embezzling funds. Quick later arrives at Smalls' apartment looking for information on Calhoune but promptly leaves after finding Smalls' corpse; Smalls' brother Reggie sees Quick leaving and assumes he is responsible. Quick meets with Calhoune's Creole mistress Dominique LaRue for a romantic dinner, unaware Calhoune is accompanying her. Calhoune offers to hire Quick to manage his Pitty-Pat Club but he declines. Outside, Quick is attacked by, and kills, Reggie and his friends—he assumes they were sent by Calhoune to assassinate him. Later, Calhoune has Dominique seduce Quick, but Quick becomes suspicious of her when he finds a gun hidden on the bed and unloads it as a precaution. When the unaware Dominique tries to use the gun on Quick, he shoots her dead. Ray sends Quick into hiding while Calhoune retaliates by having Cantone raid the club and eventually having it burned down.

Ray learns that Calhoune's bag man Richie Vento will be collecting the cash from the bets and has his old friend Madame Vera assign one of her escorts, Sunshine, to seduce and convince the besotted Richie to allow her to accompany him on the collection. While Calhoune is distracted by the boxing match, Ray's men blow up the Pitty-Pat. Richie collects the bag of betting cash and stores it in his car alongside Sunshine's identical bag supposedly containing numbers racket papers. An orchestrated car crash allows Ray and Quick, disguised as policemen, to intervene and take the money bag, claiming Sunshine is a prolific heroin dealer and the bag contains narcotics. Two white officers arrive, dismiss Ray and Quick, and take Sunshine and the bag away. Cantone, who was overseeing the cash delivery, follows Ray and Quick to a disused bank and confronts them. They reveal they had anticipated Cantone's involvement and trap him in the bank vault, promising to have him released in a few days.

Calhoune realizes he has been tricked, as Jenkins easily defeats Kirkpatrick, and returns home in a rage after learning that the Pitty-Pat was destroyed. Richie unwittingly delivers Sunshine's bag to Calhoune, who realizes Ray is behind the scheme because it contains parcels of sugar. Vera, seemingly afraid for her safety, visits Calhoune and confesses that Ray and Quick are at Ray's house. Calhoune and his men go there and trigger hidden explosives that kill all of them.

On the outskirts of Harlem, Ray and Quick pay the white officers for their role in the plan and split up Calhoune's money. Believing there is nowhere like Harlem, but knowing they can never safely return, Ray takes a final look at the skyline before departing with Quick and his friends to start over in another city.

Cast

* Eddie Murphy as Vernest "Quick" Brown, Sugar Ray's adopted son who helps him run his club.
** Desi Arnez Hines II as Young Vernest "Quick" Brown
* Richard Pryor as "Sugar" Ray, a candy store owner who also operates an illegal after-hours nightclub.
* Redd Foxx as Bennie "Snake Eyes" Wilson, a nearly-blind craps dealer.
* Danny Aiello as Sergeant Phil Cantone, a crooked cop who works for Bugsy Calhoun.
* Michael Lerner as "Bugsy" Calhoun, the crime boss who owns most of the after-hours clubs in Harlem.
* Della Reese as Vera Walker, the madam at Ray's club.
* Stan Shaw as Jack Jenkins, the current heavyweight boxing champion, who has a severe stutter.
* Jasmine Guy as Dominique La Rue, Bugsy Calhoun's mistress.
* Arsenio Hall as Reggie, Tommy Smalls' brother.
* Berlinda Tolbert as Annie, Sugar Ray's wife.
* Vic Polizos as Richie Vento, the bag man who makes cash pickups for Bugsy Calhoun.
* Lela Rochon as "Sunshine", a prostitute who works at Ray's club.
* David Marciano as Tony, one of Bugsy Calhoun's goons.
* Thomas Mikal Ford as Tommy Smalls, the manager of one of Bugsy Calhoun's clubs.
* Carmen Filpi as Doorman
* Miguel A. Núñez Jr. as Man With Broken Nose
* Charlie Murphy as Jimmy
* Robin Harris as Romeo
* John Kennedy Horne as "Slim", gambler

Production

The part of Dominique La Rue, played by Jasmine Guy, was originally cast with actress Michael Michele. Michele was fired during production because, according to Murphy, she "wasn't working out". Michele sued Murphy, saying that in reality she was fired for rejecting Murphy's romantic advances. Murphy denied the charge, saying that he had never even had a private conversation with her. The lawsuit was settled out of court for an undisclosed sum.

"It's turning out to be more pleasant than I expected," Pryor told ''Rolling Stone''. " urphy iswise enough to listen to people. I seen him be very patient with his actors. It's not a lark to him. He's really serious." "He's on top of the world and he's doing a hell of a job," agreed Foxx. "He sure knows how to handle people with sensitivity. He'll come over to your side and give private direction—he never embarrasses anyone." "You walk around here and look at the people," added Pryor. "Have you ever in your life seen this many black people on a movie set? I haven't."

About the movie's reception, Murphy said: "It wasn't a pleasurable experience. I just wanted to direct—just to see if I can do it. And I found out that I can't, and I won't do it anymore. And the biggest thing is I didn't enjoy doing it. The problem with ''Harlem Nights'' wasn't the directing as much as it was the writing of it. It was just written fucked up, and that's because I threw it together real quick. And then it was disappointing because Richard wasn't the way I thought Richard was gonna be. I thought it would be like a collaborative thing where I would get to work with my idol, and then it would be like, "This is great." But Richard would come to the set, say his line and leave, it wasn't like a collaborative thing."

Later he said: "That movie was a blur. It was Richard ryor Robin Harris—all comedians. I remember Richard and Redd Foxx laughing offstage during the whole movie. The funniest shit was off camera, we're all just crying. Redd was a really funny dude, he would have the set screaming all the time. But afterwards it was like, Whoa, that's a lot of work. I was really young when I did it. I had one foot in the club, and one foot on the set, a lot of shit going on. It's amazing it came together." He also said he didn't know Pryor was sick at the time. "He was sick with MS by then, but nobody knew it was going on. And I was like a puppy to him 'cause he was my idol. "Hey! Let's go make this movie!" I never put it together what was happening till afterwards. So it was kind of sad, that part of it."

Release

Box office

''Harlem Nights'' was released in the United States and Canada on November 17, 1989. During its opening weekend it grossed a total of $16.1million from 2,180 theaters—an average of $7,383 per theater—making it the highest grossing film of the weekend, ahead of ''Look Who's Talking'' ($8.5million) in its sixth week of release, and the debuting ''The Little Mermaid'' ($6million). This broke the record for an opening three-day gross during the pre-Christmas end of year period. In its second weekend, ''Harlem Nights'' fell to the number 2 position with a $11.1million gross—a 30.8% drop from the previous week—placing it behind the debut of ''Back to the Future Part II'' ($27.8million) and ahead of ''The Little Mermaid'' ($8.4million). By its third weekend, ''Harlem Nights'' fell to the number 3 position with a $5.2million gross, placing it behind ''Back to the Future Part II'' ($12.1million) and the debut of ''National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation'' ($11.8million).

In total, ''Harlem Nights'' grossed $60.9million, making it only the 21st-highest-grossing film of 1989 in the United States and Canada. The film's gross outside of these countries is unknown.

Movie theater shooting controversy

On November 17, 1989, two men were shot in the parking lot outside of the AMC Americana 8 theater in the Detroit suburb of Southfield, Michigan. According to witnesses quoted in the ''Detroit Free Press'', the shooting happened on opening night taking place during a shooting spree in the film's opening. A 22-year-old woman, who panicked and ran into traffic, was in critical condition two days later at the city's Providence Hospital; her name was withheld by police. Less than an hour after the shooting, police arrived at the theater to find a 24-year-old Detroit man who had shot at an officer. The gunman was wounded when the officer shot him back in the theater parking lot. The incident caused the theater chain to cancel showings of ''Harlem Nights''. One resident of the area, D'Shanna Watson, said:

Later that night, brawlers were ejected from a Sacramento theater showing ''Harlem Nights''. Their feud continued in a parking lot and ended with gunshots. Two 24-year-old men were seriously injured. An hour later, Marcel Thompson, 17, was fatally shot in a similar fight at a theater in Richmond, California. When police stopped the projection of ''Harlem Nights'' to find suspects, an hour-long riot erupted. In Boston, Mayor Raymond Flynn saw so many fistfights taking place in a crowd leaving ''Harlem Nights'' that he at first threatened to close the theater down but decided to tighten police security at the theater. Flynn blamed the film for the riot, stating that it "glorifies violence." However, Raymond Howard, a lieutenant of the Richmond police department, defended the film, saying, "There's nothing wrong with the show. But this tells me something about the nature of kids who are going to see these shows."

Reception

Critical response

Michael Wilmington noted in the ''Los Angeles Times'' that the "production design lacks glitter. The movie also lacks the Harlem outside the gaudy gangland environs, the poverty, filth, pain, humanity, humor and danger that feeds these mobster fantasies."

Both Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert panned the film; it was featured on their "Worst of 1989" review show with Siskel stating that it was racist, sexist, and badly directed, and Ebert agreeing with him, also adding that they thought Murphy was directing a film to call himself a director.

About the negative reception, Eddie Murphy said: "There was a validity to a lot of things that people were saying about ''Harlem Nights'' but then they went extra mean on it because it was me. I guess they viewed it as someone with an ego out-of-control doing all these things... It wasn't that at all. As much as "let me see if I can do that" and I did. And I was like "I don't like this. I'm never doing this again".

However, the Rotten Tomatoes audience approval stands at 80%.

Accolades

* Stinkers Bad Movie Awards:
** Worst Picture
* Golden Raspberry Award:
** Worst Screenplay (Eddie Murphy)

;Nominated
* Academy Awards:
** Academy Award for Best Costume Design ( Joe I. Tompkins)
* Golden Raspberry Award
** Worst Director (Eddie Murphy)

Footnotes

References

External links

*
*
*

{{DEFAULTSORT:Harlem Nights
1989 films
1989 directorial debut films
1980s buddy comedy-drama films
1980s buddy cop films
1980s crime comedy-drama films
1980s English-language films
1980s heist films
1980s police comedy films
1980s police procedural films
African-American comedy-drama films
American buddy comedy-drama films
American buddy cop films
American crime comedy-drama films
American heist films
American police detective films
English-language crime comedy-drama films
Films about African-American organized crime
Films about organized crime in the United States
Films directed by Eddie Murphy
Films scored by Herbie Hancock
Films set in Harlem
Films set in Manhattan
Films set in New York City
Films set in the 1910s
Films set in 1918
Films set in the 1930s
Films set in 1938
Films with screenplays by Eddie Murphy
Golden Raspberry Award–winning films
Mass shootings in the United States
Paramount Pictures films
1980s American films
1989 in American cinema
English-language buddy comedy-drama films
English-language thriller films