Cast of original 'Beverly Hills Cop' movie is back for 'Axel F': Where were they?
As movie cast reunions go, few will generate more nostalgic laughs than the one assembled for “Beverly Hills Cop: Alex F.”
The fourth installment in the franchise (streaming now on Netflix) comes 40 years after the original Eddie Murphy launch pad, and 30 years after the third movie in the series.
But John Landis’ 1994 film “Beverly Hills Cop III” fared less well at the box office than its predecessors and noticeably excluded a few key players, including John Ashton as the lovable but tough cop John Taggart and Paul Reiser as affable detective Jeffrey Friedman.
This time, the core “Cop” team is back, including Taggart and Reiser, as well as Bronson Pinchot as art dealer Serge. A few newcomers to Murphy’s humor-meets-mayhem camp include Taylour Paige as his daughter Jane, Kevin Bacon as Captain Grant, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt as cop Bobby Abbott.
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"We had done three 'Beverly Hills Cop' movies, but the third one is a little soft compared to the other two, and it’s because we don’t have all of the people from the original," Murphy tells USA TODAY.
"Now, we're back with John back as Taggart, we've got Paul, we’ve got Bronson, you just needed all the ingredients that were in the first picture," he says. "Everyone who was alive − well, except for Lisa Eilbacher (she played Axel's sleuthing pal Jenny), who is very much still alive − but everyone else, we brought them back. And it was so good to be back on set with them."
We take a quick look at what some of those original “Cop” cast members have been up to over the decades:
Eddie Murphy
Murphy’s huge success with “Beverly Hills Cop” was followed a steady string of movies with mixed box-office results, including “The Golden Child” and “Another 48 Hrs.”
But in 1988, Murphy found his comedic grove again, teaming up with pal Arsenio Hall for “Coming to America,” a premise he’d return to in 2021’s “Coming 2 America.” He played multiple characters, a nod to his idol Peter Sellers, and would again showcase his chameleon talents in 1996’s “The Nutty Professor.”
The 63-year-old star's resume is too lengthy and diverse to summarize. Suffice to say, he’s recorded albums as a vocalist, created two classic stand-up specials (“Delirious” and “Raw”), made voicing a donkey cool (“Shrek”), won a Primetime Emmy for his "Saturday Night Live" hosting return, was given the Mark Twain Prize for humor, and is the proud father of 10 children.
Judge Reinhold
Reinhold, 67, rocketed to fame on the heels of his likable if befuddled police officer in “Beverly Hills Cop,” boasting a pal-next-door appeal that would later be claimed by actors such as Jason Segel. While Reinhold tried to parlay that success into leading roles, his movie “Vice Versa” was a flop. Reinhold returned to his supporting role niche, both in the “Cop” sequels and the Tim Allen star vehicle series “The Santa Clause.”
Many TV fans may best know Reinhold for his 1994 Emmy-nominated “Seinfeld” stint, in which he played a “close talker” (someone who stands uncomfortably close during a conversation) who develops an unnatural affection for Jerry’s parents.
John Ashton
Ashton, 76, was another working actor whose role in “Beverly Hills Cop” made him suddenly recognizable. But nevertheless, his bread and butter would remain character roles in a long string of movies and TV shows over the subsequent decades.
While his most high-profile non-Taggart role was that of a rival bounty hunter in the cult classic movie “Midnight Run,” Ashton spent nearly 40 years, from 1974 to 2012, appearing in countless TV series, including “Kojak,” “Wonder Woman,” “M*A*S*H,” “Dallas” and “Law & Order: SVU.”
Bronson Pinchot
Pinchot, 65, made a name for himself shortly out of Yale, the year before “Cop” came out, when he appeared in the Tom Cruise classic “Risky Business.” His performance as the outrageous and wildly accented art dealer in “Cop” then led to memorable appearances in movies such as “After Hours,” “True Romance” and “The First Wives Club.”
While he has largely been away from Tinseltown’s spotlight in the past decades, Pinchot has made a name for himself as an audiobook narrator, with some 400 plus titles to his credit so far, ranging from Flannery O’Connor novels to the “Memoirs of General William T. Sherman.”
Paul Reiser
Reiser, 68, is another actor who before “Cop” appeared in a now-classic film, 1982’s “Diner.” His success in Murphy’s cop comedy eventually led to NBC greenlighting a sitcom Reiser co-created, “Mad About You” (1992 to 1999), in which he co-starred with Helen Hunt as his onscreen wife. While that series won a host of awards, 2011’s “The Paul Reiser Show” lasted but a few episodes.
Reiser is less known for his considerable musical skills. He co-composed the theme song for “Mad About You,” and has collaborated with singers such as Melissa Manchester. His early forays as a musical act eventually bombed enough for him to turn to stand-up comedy.