Vanessa Bell Calloway says colourism affected her ‘Coming to America’ casting

Actress Vanessa Bell Calloway is speaking out about her audition for Coming to America, and she revealed that Imani Izzi wasn’t the original role she was looking to be cast for.

Calloway played Princess Imani in 1988’s Coming to America, who was originally supposed to marry Eddie Murphy’s Prince Akeem before he travelled to New York and found his true bride in Lisa McDowell, played by Shari Headley. It turns out that Calloway originally auditioned for the lead female role of Lisa, and she thinks that her complexion played into the decision to cast her as Imani instead. 

“When you have white people hiring Black people in movies, sometimes a certain look is wanted,” Calloway told Page Six. The 67-year-old actress said she got the impression that Coming to America’s team “wanted a light-skinned girl” to play the role of Lisa.

“I just wasn’t light enough, even though Eddie had the final say on who played Lisa,” she said. The Shameless actress said that was "something that we’ve always dealt with within our race: A lot of men were indoctrinated by having a white woman or light-skinned woman on their arm."

Calloway said that she didn’t want the role of Imani. “I wanted to be Lisa — I had read the script, and I wanted the bigger role,” she said.

The production team behind Coming to America allegedly told Calloway that she would be a great fit for the role of Imani and asked her to read for that part instead. “At that point, I knew I was not going to get Lisa. So I went outside in the hallway, looked over the part with five minutes of preparation, went back in, and did the best I could,” she explained.

Calloway, who will appear in the film’s sequel, Coming 2 America, said that she was still grateful for the role of Imani and the chance to work alongside Murphy.

“The real deal is, when you’re in a situation like that, you wanna be a part of an Eddie Murphy movie. I wasn’t gonna say no! I would’ve loved to have had the lead part, but I was very happy to be in the movie. I can’t lie about that,” Calloway told the outlet. “I said, ‘I’ll make the best out of this and I’ll be the best.’ It was a smaller role but it was a glamorous part to play. And Shari did a great job."

It's worth it to note that colourism in Coming to America has been criticized before.

After working on Coming to America, Calloway went on to appear in films like What's Love Got to Do with It, Crimson Tide and Daylight. She had many starring roles in TV series including Under One Roof and Rhythm & Blues. She was cast as the lead character in Saints & Sinners and she plays Carol Fisher, the mother of Veronica, in Shameless. It was recently announced that Calloway will play Kenan Thompson's mother on his new sitcom, Kenan.

Coming to America director John Landis has not responded to Calloway’s comments as of this writing.

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