Everyone reenacted that “Soul Glo” commercial in 1988’s Coming to America, but Wesley Snipes wanted to truly let his Soul Glo. No really; he wanted to play the actual character with the infamous Jheri curl, Darryl Jenks.
Snipes recently joined the cast of Dolemite Is My Name for a special roundtable hosted by Netflix and admitted he was “sad” when he auditioned for the role of Darryl and didn’t get the role, which was ultimately portrayed by Eriq La Salle.
“I auditioned for ‘Coming to America’ and I remember being so sad,” Snipes admitted.
“I really wanted to be in the movie,” Snipes added. “I wanted to work with him and I was really contemplating what my purpose in life was after losing that to Eriq La Salle.”
Of course, it had nothing to do with his lack of talent, because Snipes certainly gave a standout performance in Dolemite Is My Name. Murphy confirmed the two just had too similar looks. Darryl was the antagonist to Murphy’s Prince Akeem and the two vied for the affections of Lisa McDowell (Shari Headley).
“Our look was too close,” Murphy confirmed. “And you actually look more African than me!” Snipes then joked that had he known that before, he would’ve felt much better about his place in this industry.
“I didn’t know none of that man. That would’ve healed me,” Snipes said. “I was in the bathroom, ‘Why am I even doing this, man? I’m not gonna quit! They not gonna break me down, man!’”
Regardless, he’ll be getting another chance to live in the world of Zamunda as he’ll be portraying General Izzi, the villain butting heads with Prince Akeem in Coming 2 America. The cast is currently filming the sequel in Atlanta and it is set to be released in theaters Dec. 18, 2020.
Snipes looked into the camera exclaiming, “Now Eriq!” playfully mocking the fact that he’s in the second movie while La Salle has reportedly opted out of joining the extra black-ass cast. Murphy noted La Salle was definitely “too light-skinned” to play Izzi, thus it’s like the reverse of what initially happened with Snipes. “Where’s your Jheri curl now?” Mike Epps teased as the cast laughed.
The full roundtable interview is available below: